Sonic and the Light of Chaos
by Lightspeed935
Summary: Sonic's friends all would agree on one thing, never let dark sonic free, but is there something else they should worry about in Sonic. A tale they could never have imagined was about to write itself. Everything is not so black and white with Sonic as everyone had thought, or is it... lliw eht dnah yb nellaf esir ym 666.
1. Chapter 1 The Beginning of the End

**Chapter 1 The Beginning of the End**

It was a stormy day in Mobius, rain poured down from the sky, the wind blew swiftly through the sky and the black clouds loomed over the heroes as they made their way to Angel island. Tails carefully flew the plane with Amy and Cream in the two back seats. Sonic had refused Tails' offer to go in the third seat, although he had put in the third seat for this occasion. Even when it had gotten stormy, Sonic still decided to stay on the wing. His shoes planted firmly on the wing, the restless wind blowing against him, his face with a serious expression.

"Are you sure you don't want to come in, Sonic? It's getting seriously windy out there" Tails asked from the cockpit. Sonic folded his arms. "No... besides, were almost there." Tails nodded, "Your right. Hold on, Sonic, this is going to get bumpy! Tails said sternly. Sonic knelt down on one knee and put his hand on the wing for support. Tails spotted a relatively clear area and dropped the plane low to the ground, the bumped off the ground once, causing Cream to squeal in the back seat. All of a sudden, there was a sound of thunder. Tails jumped in his seat, banging his head against the window.

"Ouch!" He yelped in pain, rubbing his head. The wheel had been turned to the right from Tails jump, without him knowing.

"TAILS"! Amy shouted in her seat, pointing at the tree in front of them. Tails was still in a bit of a daze, unaware of what was happening. Just as the plane was about the hit the tree, Sonic jumped off the plane and sliced the tree from the bottom. The plane slid over what was left of the tree and just about stopped, avoiding the next tree. Sonic zipped over to the plane. Tails opened the cockpit and slowly got out. Followed shortly by Amy and Cream. They breathed heavily and looked blankly into the distance.

"You okay?" Sonic said to the group. After Amy had gotten over her shock, she glared at Tails. Tails chuckled nervously, backing away from Amy.

"I am, but I don't know if Amy is, hehe" Tails said, sweat appearing on his face. Amy took out her hammer and slammed it into the ground.

"You almost crashed into a tree because of some silly thunder!" Amy shouted furiously. Tails gulped nervously, "A little help, Sonic. Sonic?" Tails looked around him, but found no sight of the blue blur.

"He went ahead. I think he got a bit bored" Cream said.

"Oh" Amy and Tails said in unison.

* * *

Sonic was making his way to the shrine, already seeing a giant robot there. "How did we miss that on the way in?" Sonic said to himself. Moments later, he was at the shrine, seeing the robot in great detail now.

"Whoa..." was all Sonic could say. He saw that the robot was drilling in the ground for something. He quickly snapped out of it and spin dashed towards the robots drill. He smashed into it at full speed, knocking the drill out of the ground and damaging it a little. Eggman, who had been in his Egg mobile the whole time, looked down at the ground, trying the find the culprit for the disturbance. He spotted a blue hedgehog.

"Sonic! Of course, who else. So what does the rat want this time. Am I not allowed to even dig these days without your permission!" He shouted down at Sonic. Sonic glared at Eggman, "No, your not. Where's Knuckles?" Sonic said seriously. Eggman cocked an eyebrow.

"Wow, your straight to the point. Wake up on the wrong side of the field you rat!" Eggman said with a laugh. Sonic gritted his teeth and clenched his fists.

"I said... Where's Knuckles!" Sonic shouted. Eggmans eyes went wide with shock. He was stunned for a moment, but regained his composure.

"Oh I dunno. I think he was pounded in the direction of that mountain, the one over there." Eggman said, pointing behind him teasingly.

Sonic's body started to shake in anger. He then started breathing out heavily, trying to calm himself down. Once he had calmed, looked back up at Eggman.

"Okay, bring it on Egghead!" Sonic said confidently.

"Hmpf, Eggdriller, crush this rat." Eggman said in disgust. Sonic charged at the robot. The robot smashed the ground in front of him, creating a mini earthquake.

"What the?" Sonic said as he was flung into the air by the force. Eggman grinned. "Smash him?!" Eggman shouted jumping from his seat. As Sonic was left helpless in the air, he could only say one thing.

"Uh oh..." he said as his vision was filled with metal. The gigantic drill made contact with the hedgehog's body, sending him flying far into the woods, completely out of view of Eggman.

"Ho Ho Ho Ho, that's another one out of the park. We got a mean swinger here boys and girls. Nice job, Eggdriller!" He said, applauding his magnificent robot. In response, the robot smashed his gigantic fist against his chest.

"Whoa, calm down, Eggdriller. You'll damage yourself if you not careful!" Eggman scolded. He sighed.

"Honestly, sometimes my robots are too strong for their own good" Eggman said, leaning his hands on his hand in thought.

* * *

 **Amy's POV**

How dare Sonic leave me behind, sometimes I wonder why I bother. I mean he always runs from me, and when he isn't running away, he isn't bothered to listen to me, the nerve of him! I think Tails is right, something must be wrong with him if he doesn't want to spend time with me.

 **Normal POV**

"Amy, could you please pass me the cloth? We need to get Knuckles cleaned up right away, he's in serious trouble!" Tails said putting his hand out. Amy snapped out of her thoughts and rushed over to the medical kit and grabbed a couple of cloths and gave them to Tails. Tails quickly got to work, cleaning Knuckles' wounds up. They had found Knuckles on their way to the shrine. They would have asked him how he got so messed up, but they could see the gigantic robot in the distance, so the question answered itself. Knuckles opened his eyes after having passed out when he found Tails. He slowly got up.

"Easy, Knuckles." Tails said, helping him up. Knuckles spat out a bit of blood, he gave a little grin.

"Heh, I'm fine, Tails, really!" Knuckles said, trying to stand by himself. Tails still went over to him, holding his shoulder up. He knew Knuckles was just trying to be tough, he needed to take it easy. Cream looked at Knuckles with more worry then Tails.

"Are you going to be okay, Knuckles. You're... bleeding a lot... Cream said turning away. They had obviously forgotten how young Cream was. Tails was surprised that Sonic had told Cream not to come, arguing against Amy. Amy had won the argument, but now that he thought about it, Sonic was right. Cream was too young for this. Tails then noticed the robot had disappeared from over the trees.

"Hey guys, where did the giant robot go?" Tails asked. Knuckles shrugged. Tails got up off a rock and walked up to Knuckles.

"Come on, Knuckles. I'll help you get the shrine. Come on Amy and Cream." Tails said as he started walking with Knuckles. They got up and joined him. As they made their way to the shrine, Knuckles had been getting a little better, not needing Tails as much for support.

"I cant believe that robot. Taking out the great Knuckles in one hit, one... hit! Knuckles said again.

"Really? One hit?" Tails said in surprise. He knew Knuckles well, and he was not a pushover in fighting.

"I know, right!? Crazy!" Knuckles said. They continued on, the rain had started getting heavy again after just disappearing. Amy looked up into the sky. A fear that something bad had happened was creeping in her mind, "I hope he's okay..." Amy thought.


	2. Chapter 2: no reward for the good

**This is one of the most important chapters in the story, that's all I'll say.**

 **Chapter 4**

 **Shadow's POV**

I've been walking around Angel island for two hours and I can't find Eggman anywhere. I only saw Knuckles and his friends, but I ignored them and went the other way, maybe not the best idea, they looked like they knew where they were going.

I jumped up onto a tree to get a better view. Where are you Eggman, and what are you using the master emerald for. There is no point in staying here any longer though I have chaos emeralds to find, "Chaos... CONTROL!"

 **Normal POV**

"Calm down knuckles", Knuckles froze, he slowly turned around to face Amy. "Calm down", Calm... DOWN", Tails put his hands over his ears "here we go... "THE MASTER EMERALD IS GONE AND YOUR TELLING ME TO CALM DOWN!"

"yes" replied Amy with a cheeky smile. Knuckles head turned into a balloon and he flew away (not literally of course). "there goes knuckles", Tails looked at knuckles leave, "well that happened. Wait a minute, why hasn't the island fallen into the water! Amy and Cream froze, Knuckles stopped yelling and looked at them. No one said anything for a good minute. "The emerald is still here!" Knuckles ran off towards the shrine. "Knuckles wait!" yelled Amy. "Lets follow him", Amy and Cream nodded their heads in agreement and they took off

Your all probably wondering, were the hell is SONIC! He's there somewhere, okay

"HO HO HO" laughed Eggman, "those fools think the Emerald is back, but I really have the new Egg battle ship underneath the island stopping it from falling into the ocean". "I hate to bother you boss but our ship holding the whole island up is a little impossible". Eggman grabbed orbot,"impossible is my middle name orbot, I destroyed half of the moon, I always seem to pop up when Sonic and his friends find a Choas emerald and steal it and I an have unnaturally amazing moustache, need I go on". "nope, you made it clear boss, your like any bad guy". Eggman took out a button from his pocket, "you see this orbot, this is my new ultimate weapon, with the power from the master emerald and the two chaos I already had i could make this", "but make what boss", orbot said with confusion. "you'll see... and so will Shadow". Orbot gave Eggman a blank expression (like he had any to begin with). "what" said Eggman. "Well its just that all of your inventions are always targeted at Sonic, why the change in enemy". "You fool! Of course I still hate Sonic, in fact that's why this mind control weapon is for Shadow not Sonic, and also because Shadow is more powerful than Sonic" replied Eggman. "that last point is debatable boss, but it is a good plan even for your genius" said orbot with an impressed voice. Eggman looked in the distance and saw Shadow talking to Tails, "its him! The time has come, lets go". Eggman flew off towards the shrine.

"So your saying we need to find Eggman's base today?" said Shadow. "Yes, Eggman is fast at doing stuff, in about two to three days he could strike based on previous attacks" replied Tails. Shadow pondered on this for a minute or two not aware of Eggman sneaking around the bushes.

Tails ears shot up, he looked into the forest and saw a figure moving slowly "guys look", said Tails. Everyone looked in the direction Tails was. The figure slowly came in to view through the rain (yes it's still raining, I just wasn't mentioning it). Sonic slowly walked, drenched by the cold rain (Amy and Cream had umbrellas covering must of the rain from the group). He had scars and bruises on his legs and arms, a lot of blood stained on the right side of his stomach and a big cut coming form the left side of his forehead with blood flowing slowly down his face.

"Jesus, what the hell happened to you?" said Knuckles. "Don't ask" grunted Sonic while looking at his left glove that was now covered in blood, from putting it against his stomach. "we need to get you to a doctor now Sonic! oh and you to knuckles" said Amy with concern. "It's good to have you back Sonic" said Knuckles just before he lightly punched Sonic in the arm. "OW!" yelled Sonic stumbling backwards bumping into Shadow. A huge blast was heard and an electric beam hit Sonic in the back. The beam instantly pushed everyone except Sonic away and pulled Sonic towards the shrine were a lot of energy beams hit Sonic from every direction. "AHHHHHH!" screamed Sonic in intense pain. "NO! turn off the machine orbot!" Shouted Eggman. "I can't boss, it won't shut off, but this could still work... right boss". Eggman looked ahead at Sonic, then at his friends all desperately trying to free him, "this contraption was designed for Shadow's body only, so I hope so..."

Knuckles, Amy and Tails tried to get near it, but were blasted by the electric energy field around it. Shadow tried spindashing through it, but it pushed him back as well. He tried several chaos spears, but nothing could break through the energy field. Shadow panted and stood back with the others and sighed in defeat. "we can't just watch this, we have to save him!" shouted Tails. "no" said Shadow, everyone looked at him in shock. "There's nothing we can do, but hope"Shadow said sadly and closed his eyes. Amy and Cream started to cry, while Tails and Knuckles looked in horror at the pain Sonic was experiencing. (the best visual I can give for this is what happened in the opening of Sonic unleashed)

Sonic continued to scream in pain, while gritting his teeth together in agony, nothing could describe the pain the blue hero of Mobious felt at that time, and for the next five minutes. His current condition prior to this made it seem impossible to even think that he would survive this pain.

Then all of a sudden there was no sound of screaming in pain, no electricity, no crying, just rain, rain pouring down heavily from the clouds on the back of the burnt hero, cooling him down and releasing smoke off his body.

Then there was no rain, just silence...

evag dna dereffus eh rof ti gnihtyreve eh...


	3. Chapter 3 The Realisation

**Chapter 5 The Realisation**

"The next few days were very sad days for everyone. Amy and Cream cried a lot, mostly Amy. Knuckles being the tough one stayed quite strong on the outside, but on the inside he did feel real sadness for what had happened. He didn't like Sonic that much compared to his friends thoughts on the blue blur, but now that he was gone he felt terrible about what he would say to Sonic when he was being childish. Tails, like Knuckles tried to stay strong on the outside, but failed miserable. He cried a lot, mostly when he was alone. His best friend, his big brother was gone, there was no chaos emeralds to save him this time, no chance of doctors saving him, no hope, Sonic was gone. Shadow's thoughts were mixed about the situation. He did hate Sonic in a lot of ways, but he also saw him as a rival to him, a challenge that no one else could give him. The main thing Shadow respected in Sonic was his never back down attitude, and ability to always do what was right, no matter the cost.

"Eggman at first was happy, I mean really really happy. He didn't even yell at orbot or cubot for the first two days. As the third day progressed however, Eggman begin to think about what had really happened. Sonic was a pain in his life, and he hated him, but he was a hero to the world. Was this really how it should end, sure he wanted victory, but this? This wasn't what Sonic deserved. This was one of the worst deaths he had ever witnessed, and Eggmam reads a lot about torture methods. Sonic was the greatest hero on the planet, and he left the world in what is probably the worst way imaginable. No, it wasn't right, and Eggman knew this deep within his heart. Sonic didn't deserve this kinda pain, no matter how much the doctor wanted it, he had some sense of mercy buried somewhere in his evil heart.

"The rest of Sonic's friends had very similar reactions as Knuckles,Tails,Cream and Amy. Blaze in particular was heart broken. You would think this of just Amy, but Blaze also felt this because she remembered how Sonic helped her become the nicer girl she is now, rather then the cold hearted girl she once was.

"Sonic's funeral had taken place on the night of the second day. It had a small turnout because only Sonic's friends were allowed to attend because of the numbers otherwise. Eggman did see the funeral with his binoculars and a sound recorder placed behind the tombstone allowed him to hear it. The news channels were all about Sonic. Lots of people made speeches about his heroic accomplishments in life. Knuckles and Vector gave a speech themselves. The others refused to, or weren't asked.

"Sonic's death happened seven days before Halloween started, but considering his death, it won't be as joyful as last year.

"How could something designed to brainwash do something so horrible, is the question that is in Eggman's mind as of the last few days.

"The truth of the matter was, the realisation of what had just happened hit them all around the sixth day. Sonic was dead, and he wasn't coming back, ever.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 7**

 **Two months later**

Shadow skated inside Eggman's base with little ease. "where is he keeping them damn chaos emeralds" Shadow said while throwing some chaos spears at security robots. Shadow jumped in the air and started homing attacking robots. Eggman watched the destruction Shadow was creating from the security cameras. The one's Shadow hadn't already broken. "If that hedgehog thinks he's getting my four chaos emeralds, he's sadly mistaken" Eggman said with a smirk. "I am curious to see how much destruction he'll cause just to get the chaos emeralds. Then when I see he won't back down, I'll sent in the big boy, ho ho ho ho Eggman Laughed. Robot after robot fell as Shadow skated through the complex, getting further angered at each room he checked with no chaos emeralds. "where's that damn room with the chaos emeralds" Shadow groaned in frustration.

Shadow got to the end of the hallway and saw a huge door. If that's not a chaos emerald holding room then I don't know what is, Shadow thought to himself. Shadow ripped straight through the door with a spin dash

 **Eggman's POV**

I heard a load explosion coming from the testing room. Now the real show begins. I flew to the room above the testing room and looked down to see Shadow trying to find the chaos emeralds. That fool. I give a couple of claps to get his attention. "You won't find the chaos emeralds down there". Shadow looked up at me with a dark look. "you better hand the chaos emeralds over, or you'll be sorry" said Shadow.

Who does he think he is, threatening the greatest genius that ever lived. The Eggdriller hasn't failed yet, and today won't change that unbeaten status. Knuckles, Silver and Sonic... couldn't beat him, you won't be any different. Shadow was running on the walls to get to me. Impatient little fellow isn't he. I press a button from my controller that will finish that hedgehog off for good!

 **Normal POV**

The Eggdriller smashed through the wall hitting shadow back to the ground. "Shit, not this thing, Knuckles wasn't lying. This thing is massive!"

"you've met your match now Shadow. The Eggdriller is one of the most impressive robot I, or anyone has ever made. He is unstoppable!

 **Shadow's POV**

Eggman's right about one thing, that robot is impressive. He stands on two huge robotic legs, he has to giant arms, in his right hand he holds a giant drill and the robot is about a hundred and fifty feet in height.

"ho ho ho ho ho, from the look on your face I'd say you realise you won't win this one Shadow. I will however give you a chance to leave if you give me the green chaos you always conveniently seem to have regardless of how many times they get spread out across the planet". "If you seriously think I'm going to give you the emerald then your more crazy then I thought." Eggman shook his head, "you disappoint me Shadow. Eggdriller destroy Shadow the hedgehog.

The Eggdriller suddenly started activating all it's weapons. Crap, this is not going to be easy. I got into a fighting stance with a focused mind. This thing has already beaten the others it has fought with what looks to be little damage, or Eggman fixed it.

My rings are going to be coming of in this fight, I just know it.

 **The proper Eggdriller battle is about to commence in the next chapter. Eggman's lair will need a cleaning after this one.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 8**  
Tails looked up at the night sky from his window deep in thought about the death of his best friend Sonic the hedgehog. Sonic had always been a hero in Tails eyes, he thought Sonic was like an angel of peace and harmony. Sonic was amazing in every way in Tails eyes, he was fast, cheeky, heroic, brave, all the things in a true hero. That day however, The dream finally ended, and the reality sunk through. Sonic was just a hedgehog with speed, he wasn't immortal, in fact he was very killable...  
"Suddenly a star shot through the sky. Tails quickly bent on his knees and put his hands together. "I wish for Sonic to come back, even for just a day. I know I don't believe in wishing on stars, but please, I'm desperate. I want to tell Sonic how much I care about him, how much his friendship has meant to me, how much I love him, (brotherly love, okay, nothing else) please bring him back, please!" Tails eyes watered and he began to sob himself asleep praying that his wish will come through.  
"The next morning Tails was on his way to Rouge's house, he was invited along with his friends to a party. Tails didn't really want to go, but Rouge wasn't talking no for an answer so he gave in and agreed to come.  
"Tails arrived at the house and knocked on the door. The door swung open "hey Tails, glad you could make it." Rouge said in a cheerful tone. "come on in Tails, the others are waiting". Tails walked into the house and made his way to the living room with Rouge. Tails looked around the room, there was Amy, Cream, Silver and Blaze. Silver had a big bandage on his head. "Where is Knuckles and Shadow, did they not want to go?" said Tails curiously. "Knuckles is all grumpy because he got beat by Eggman's super robot, and said he had to train to be able to stop it, or something like that. Shadow went out on a mission two days ago and told me not to disturb him until today, but when I called he didn't pick up. I don't know why, maybe his mission is taking a little longer then expected."

"Silver stood up, "I know why", everyone looked at Silver. "Shadow was on a mission to get the Chaos emeralds from Eggman, just like I was. Eggman knew I was after them and found the hotel I was sleeping in and trashed it with the new robot he calls the Egg driller". Everyone except Blaze looked at Silver wide eyed. Silver continued "I tried to stop it but I couldn't. Luckily for me Blaze had come with me and saved me from being captured by it. If Blaze hadn't come back from her walk in time, I would have been captured. On the way to the hospital, we meet Shadow. I told him to not go to Eggman's lair alone, but he wouldn't listen, you know how Shadow is. While we sit here partying, Eggman is probably plotting something with his new robot. we need to think of a plan now before Eggman gets his hands on the rest of us!"

"Silver sat back down. Nobody knew what to say. Tails knew if anyone could think of a plan it was him, but without Sonic, his spark was gone. Tails sighed in defeat and looked at the ground, "I... I don't know what to do guys, I'm sorry." Tails said sadly. "It's not your fault Tails" said Amy. "But it is my fault! I'm supposed to be the one with the brains, that's what I'm good at, but I don't know what to do!" Tails ran out of the house with tears in his eyes. Cream ran out the door after him. Cream felt like giving up but she eventually caught him sitting by a tree with his face buried into his hands. Cream slowly walked up to tails. "Tails, it's not your fault that you can't think of a plan". Tails looked up at Cream's sad face with guilt. "I didn't mean to upset you Cream by crying, but I couldn't help it, I feel like everything is falling apart before my eyes, and I cant stop it. Cream went down on her knees and Gave Tails a warm hug. Tails blushed a little as he was being hugged. "My mom told me that a nice warm hug can help when your feeling sad". Cream let go of Tails and stood up, "feeling better"? Tails smiled weekly "yeah, thanks Cream". "Your welcome. Do you want to come back to the party now? " said Cream. "okay" said Tails. Tails stood up and walked back to the the house with Cream.

"Metal Sonic came out from behind a tree, "Eggman location of Miles prowler being sent". Metal Sonic was suddenly hit hard in the back of the head. Metal Sonic fell to the ground and shut off. "Your not sending anything to Eggman, the fox is mine now" grinned the shadow. A bat walked by "what the heck!" he shouted. The Shadow ran over and grabbed over to him and grabbed him by the throat. "remember this name, because it's the last thing you'll hear, I am the knight of death! The bat was thrown in the air and sliced in half by a sword. He put away the bloody sword and walked off in the direction of Tails and Cream with glowing red eyes and a dark frown on his face.  
leef eh edam efas tsuj gnieb dengis mih maerc em dnuora


	6. Chapter 6 The Knight of Shadows!

**Chapter 9 Rise of the shadow knight**

"Tails and Cream were walking down the road back to the party. It was very late now, half twelve (late for them anyway) and it was getting a little spooky. The trees seemed to close in around them, dark clouds started to form, indicating rain approaching. The owl's very creepy hots were not helping the spooky feeling from going, in fact he was making a lot worse.

"um Tails" said Cream, "yes?" replied Tails. "Its getting kind of spooky out here, don't you think so?", Tails looked behind him, and then at the trees, "It's not just a feeling your having, I think were being watched" whispered Tails. Tails took a heat scanning device and looked around him. He noticed a signal from behind a tree to his right. "Cream I'm going to check it out, okay" whispered Tails really quietly.

"Tails walked slowly up to the tree. he tiptoed around the tree really quietly. Tails quickly rolled around the corner and pulled out a stun gun, "gotcha!". "meow" said the cat in response. Tails walked back to Cream with a cat in his hands (please don't question this, it's not that important, trust me) "false alarm" said Tails with a smile. "That's a huge relief" said Cream. Cream looked at Tails at bit before speaking again, "that was very brave of you Tails, there could have been something dangerous behind the tree". Tails put down the cat, "it was nothing, really Cream, I'm used to it." "Sure Tails, lets head back now, they could worried about us. They started to walk back,

"Wait Tails! There's a heat signature right behind us, I can see the red dot on you screen!", said Cream nervously. Tails laughed for a few seconds, "that's the cat, Cream." Cream looked up at the tree in front of them, "but the cats up there Tails" said Cream. Tails hole body froze in place. He looked behind him slowly to see nothing. "what the," Tails was suddenly knocked on the back of the neck. Tails fell motionless to the ground. "TAILS!" shouted Cream. The S Knight (that's what I'm shortening his name to okay) grabbed Cream by the hand, and pulled her close, "relax" he said soothingly, then gave her a quick chop to the back of the neck as well. "hmm, I don't think it would be fair to slice her in half, she is very young, she's very lucky. He picked up both of them and put them on each of his two shoulders. "I will have to erase her memory though, if I let her live. Finally I have the little fox in my hands, now I can move on to the next step of my plan, but first there is a pain my side, and the worlds, that needs to be dealt with. He went back to metal sonic's body, how nice for him to have to location of eggman's base for me, You make it too easy Eggman, too easy."

The S Knight dashed away from the scene with Metal Sonic and the other two with him.

"That's it!" said Silver rather loudly, "I'm going to look for them". Silver walked out the door in search of the missing two. "Should we help him? said Amy looking at the others, but got no reply in return. "I take that as a no" continued Amy with a sigh.

Silver returned about a half an hour later looking worried. "Silver, are you okay?" said Blaze curiously. "All I found was a note that said if we ever wanted to see Tails and his little bunny friend again, we would have to come to a spot in the forest, which I have marked on the map supplied with this note. Come at two am sharp tomorrow, and bring a chaos emerald with you, in exchange I will give you back your friend. Think about the trade, I always stick to my word..."

Everyone was in shock about what they had heard, but one made a stand. "I don't know why were even thinking about this, Tails and Cream are our friends, and we will get them back, no matter what! Say it!" Shouted Amy with pride. Everyone rose in sync and shouted together, "no matter what!"

evol I cinoS uoy eybdoog


	7. Chapter 7 Act, not in Anger

**Chapter 10 Read twice before you act**

"Rouge, Silver, Blaze and Amy walked down the path, following the maps directions. It was a cloudy day. Rain would be on it's way soon. Does this information matter, to them it does. They forgot their umbrella's. The weather forecast had predicted rainy weather with a high chance of thunder or potentially lightning.

"Stop" said Silver rather loudly. "Why are we stopping Silver?" asked Amy. "Were here. there's even an X to mark the spot, quite the pirate thing to do but at least we know were here". "quite right" said a mysterious voice. "Who said that" said Amy strongly.

"A shadowy figure revealed itself from behind a tree. Everyone stepped back a few feet from him and looked at him closely. He had a black suit of armour on and had a knights helmet on covering most of his facial details, the only flesh shown on him was his mouth and chin. He stepped forward with grin and looked at them curiously. "Do you have my Chaos emerald"? he asked, his face showing a more serious expression now. "We have it. Now where is Tails and Cream" said Blaze as calmly as she could. He looked at them slightly amused, "the emerald first, then you'll get your end of the bargain, as promised". Silver could feel the heat rising in Blaze's palms. "Blaze, it's fine, and besides" Silver whispered this part in her ear, "if he doesn't tell us where they are we can pound it out of him, okay". Blaze nodded in agreement.

"Silver flung the Chaos emerald over at SK ( that's the shorter version of Shadow Knight, if it wasn't clear, which I don't think it was). He caught it and grinned. "She's in the cave you just passed, you can't miss her." SK ran off with the emerald at quite a high speed. "great! Lets go" shouted Amy with excitement". "Silver thought about what he said to them and followed the others, deep in thought.

"They got there about a half an hour later and found Cream tied and gagged. "Cream!" shouted Amy running towards her undoing the rope and taking the rope out of her mouth. "Wasn't tied very tight" said Amy curiously. She shook Cream until she started to stir. She looked around, ten saw Am and jumped into her arms sobbing. "Thank you so much for finding me, he said no harm was going to come to me, but I was still really scared"said Cream still with tears in her eyes. "Do you know where Tails is Cream?" asked Silver softly. Cream gasped "I forgot about Tails. I don't know were he is since we were attacked". Silver looked around until he came across a note on the floor. Silver read it out so everyone could hear. Happy? You got what we agreed on, now everyone wins. I hope you didn't think you would get both them back. You did read the agreement again just to make sure you didn't... shall we say, overlook something? Anger can lead to confusion in the mind, interesting isn't it? You got to experience it first hand and see what can happen when you don't think things through on the right mind set, lucky you...

"Silver tore the page into little pieces using his telekinesis and growled angrily. Rouge sighed, "I hate to say this, but we all need to go to our homes and clear our minds before doing anything else, okay? Everyone had all kinds of protests, but in the end they knew she was right and all went their different ways. Silver was not going to do this however. He was going to go home as he promised, but he was going to try and find everything he could about this mysterious figure who had deceived them, and was seriously considering the idea of "take no prisoners".

 **Eggman's Ship**

Eggman typed a few buttons on his laptop, looking through top secret government files. The door opened behind him. A mysterious figure walked through. "You wanted me, master". Yes, I do need your ability's for yet another mission. I'm having problems, future problems, to be more accurate. I didn't tell you this yet because I didn't think it was a huge problem, but last week my robots were sent on there usual course to get materials and such. This time we needed a lot more then usual, so I sent newly developed gunner bot, big in size, heavy weapons, perfect for this job, in case anyone interfered. This exact thing just happened, but what I didn't expect was the kind of force the government put to stop me. It wasn't huge, but it was powerful". Eggman said with a sigh,"my little robots didn't stand a chance. My gunner robot put up a good fight, but was too reduced to scrap. Luckily I always sent a spy drone on these trips or I wouldn't know what was happening. The world is catching up on me, their still so far behind, but with the sheer numbers they have, they could overwhelm me. This is why your mission is of grave importance. You need to get into this government facility and get the robot blueprints, written copy's and software copy's, I wan't all of it gone, this is your most important mission yet, do not fail. If you do, there may not be future for either of us." Eggman said in a lower tone.

"I won't fail, master. The information you seek, will be yours" the mysterious figure said before getting a jet pack and jumping out of the ship.

Eggman sighed once again and opened up some files he hadn't looked at in a while. He looked through slowly, looking at every detail carefully. He moved his hand over the delete button. He looked at the files one last time before slowly clicked the button. He left the laptop and walked out of the door, it automatically closed itself behind him. A robotic girls voice spoke from the laptop. "Deleting all files related to the subject... Sonic the Hedgehog...Files cannot be recovered...Files deleted.

ot tub ton detnaw I taeb ekil mih siht namgee dengis


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 11**

Silver had been hard at work for the past two weeks trying to get any information about the mysterious hedgehog. Tails had secretly hacked into police criminal files to help them get information on criminals that were previously in jail. Usually the police took care of these criminals, if they broke out, or were released and hadn't learned their lessen. Sometimes they were called on the job. Tails thought it would be handy if he along with Silver had this criminal information. Silver had been searching for anyone who resembled the hedgehog, but because they didn't see any bit of his flesh, they had no idea what he looked like.

Silver was beginning to lose hope when suddenly he realised, he didn't need to find him, he just needed to lure him in with a chaos emerald. Eggman had four, they had two, and they other one was in the hands of the mystery hedgehog.

Silver made his way to Angel Island, were Knuckles was keeping the two chaos emeralds. Thanks to his floating ability and the fact that the island wasn't floating high in the air, it wasn't too much of a chore to get up there.

Knuckles was having quite a nice day. He was of course deep in thought about the problems they had been having lately, Eggman's destructive new robot, the continued robbery's with not a bit of a trail, the loss of the master emerald to eggman and then this new hedgehog. He was on Knuckles mind the most, who was he? How did he know were we lived? Knuckles needed answers, but just for this day he decided to ignore all these problems and just relax. It's kinda hard to relax though when someone's pouring water on your head! Knuckles jumped up. He looked at Silver angrily, "what the hell, Silver!" "Sorry Knuckles, but this is really important, and I couldn't shake you awake." Knuckles took a deep breathe trying to cool down. "This better be important or your going to get a beating that you won't recover from". Silver looked in shock at Knuckles statement.

 **Silver's POV**

The events of these last few weeks were obviously having a big effect on everybody. Knuckles does get angry when you wake him up in the middle of his afternoon naps, but he doesn't get this pissed. The look on his face actually makes me think he might not be kidding, lucky this is important,so I won't be finding out. "It is Knuckles, I know how we can lure the hedgehog who kidnapped Tails to us" Knuckles looked at me curiously,"I'm listening..." "Since we know he want's the chaos emeralds, all we need to do is the get his attention by getting one in the News, he'll be watching it regularly to see if news says anything about their location." Knuckles face actually got a lot brighter after I said that, he knows I'm right. "That's actually not a half bad plan Silver, clearly you need my brawn in taking him down once we lure him in, so it was not a waste of my time being woken up. hmm, You live for another day Silver, lets get going". That's one problem out of the way. I'll let him go on ahead of me, I'm faster then him so I'll catch up.

Tails brains would of been perfect to make sure this plan goes perfectly, he always thinks one step ahead. I wonder is that why he took Tails? So that it would be harder to track him down with out the brains of the operation helping us. However, the reason were after him, is because he took Tails in the first place. Something isn't adding up right, I just can't see it yet. I better catch up to Knuckles, I'm not that quick.

I floated off the island, trying to catch up with Knuckles.

 **Normal POV**

Eggman looked at Silver float off the island from his hovercraft. Eggman had thought about what he had just saw. Silver was talking to Knuckles for quite a bit, it most be something important, may not be , but if it is, the reward could be nice. This day is already going great thanks to the successful recovery of the government robotic plans, that should set them back a least a few months! Unfortunately, the Shadow Knight was injured badly. His left leg was cut open by what appears to be a chainsaw type weapon. I'm just happy he was able to make it back here with the documents. Considering his amazing ability's and the analysis report, it should take him a week to recover.

When he's ready, he'll be on a big mission to get the three chaos emeralds Silver and his animal friends have. I know they have them, and they will be in my hands soon. Eggman grinned widely "Soon the Chaos Emeralds will be all mine, then I will have all the power I need for the next step of my plan" Eggman laughed loudly, then noticed a tree chopped in half underneath him, "I don't remember my driller bot going anywhere near here, hmm. Who cares, I'm leaving this nature resort, it hurts my eyes looking at it." Eggman flew away from Angel island, and back to his ship.

evresed dlrow uoy eht tndid dengis yhw enog ruoy revlis staht


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 12 The Eggdriller Fight**

 **A few weeks ago...**

Shadow skated towards the robot readying a chaos spear. Shadow flung the chaos spear toward the robots chest. The eggdriller blocked it with it's arm, and attempted to step on Shadow. Shadow quickly sidestepped out of the way and sped towards the exit. "Get back here Shadow! You have my chaos emerald!"

 **Shadow's POV**

"Think Shadow think, I need to get outside where there's more room, but then what? This thing could take forever to destroy, there most be a faster way. If I can take out one of the legs it'll topple over, that's it!"

 **Normal POV**

"Shadow was nearing the exit deep in thought with the Eggdriller smashing through the hole fortress trying to catch up to Shadow. Shadow stopped when he got outside and turned around. "Now then Eggman, lets get back to the fight". "Smart thinking getting the Eggdiller to break my base down, but it doesn't matter, your time is up Shadow, finish him!" (insert mortal combat deaths). Shadow jumped into the air and homing attacked the robots left leg multiple times. The Eggdiller shot lasers at the ground beside his foot, forcing Shadow to back up or get fried. The Eggdiller took it's drill out from it's back and turned it on. "Ho ho ho ho ho your in trouble now ultimate life form.

Shadow gritted his teeth, "this most be it's ace card". The Eggdriller swung it at Shadow at a fair speed, Shadow hoped on the drill and started skating up it towards the robots head. "Predictable as always" Eggman said. Just as Shadow was about to spin dash into the head, three laser guns appeared on his head and all shot at Shadow at the same time. "ahhh!" Shadow screamed and was forced out off his spin dash. He smacked into the robots head and fell towards the ground. "YES! Now, grab him! The Eggdriller yanked Shadow out of the air as he fell. Shadow started to stir from being knocked out, he quickly realised he couldn't move "release me now!" "Or what? Why should I, your not getting out of his grasp any time soon, and I have a nice cosy cell with your name on it" Eggman said with a smirk. "wait a second you let knuckles and Silver go, why not me?" Shadow said. "Your too much of a threat to me to be just let free, I tried to keep Silver, but luckily for him, Blaze saved him from my clutches." Eggman chuckled, "looks like your not so lucky, ultimate life form." Eggman gloated. Shadow sighed in defeat, he couldn't escape. His only chance of getting out of the robots clutches would be to take off his inhibitar rings, but his arms were practically crushed, so taking them off proved to be impossible. "This is not gona end well for me" Shadow said.

Eggman floated up to him in his Egg hover craft (I think that's the name for it, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong though) Eggman looked at Shadow with a huge dark grin "You will cooperate, or your time with me will be much, much worse, that I can assure you." Eggman went right up to Shadow's face, "were in for one wild night.

I ssim dengis trams stnemmoc sih selkcunk.


	10. Chapter 10 The Beginning of Chaos

**Chapter 13 The Beginning of Chaos**

Tails opened his eyes slowly, adjusting to the light. He was going to stretch like he always did when he woke up, but was unable too. It was just then as he quickly glanced around, did he notice he was stuck to a wall by metal constants. He was now fully aware of the situation. He tried to break his arms free, but his efforts were not very effective. He continued trying to free himself, desperately shaking his arms and legs against the restraints, his tails too. He then gave up, sighing in defeat. He then started looking around the room. There was a computer with a table and some work planing's for something, Tails was able to see a bit of rough sketches and some handwriting. There were a few other things in the room, a lot of equipment he hadn't seen before, but what caught the foxes attention, was something big covered up by a massive sheet.

"Your wondering what's behind the sheet aren't you" said a voice from the doorway. Tails quickly darted his eyes towards the door "I don't know who you are, but please let me go" Tails said as nicely as he could. Tails wanted to be really angry and shout at him, like Knuckles had told him once. show a fearless attitude in the face of danger, but Tails couldn't do it, because a much stronger emotion had completely taken over Tails, fear. Being completely restrained by metal is scary enough, but what scared Tails even more was the person standing a few metres away from him. He had some kind of black suit of armour, like what knights wear, and a dark smirk to add to his scary features. Tails looked around him, but seeing nothing of use to his escape. It didn't matter anyway, Tails couldn't move a muscle, it was already starting to hurt his arms and legs. Tails was alone, with no one to help him. He was completely at the mercy of his captor. Tails was terrified. He had no idea what he was going to do to him. Tails started to sweat nervously.

"Your looking a little nervous. Am I scaring you?" he chuckled while walking over to the desk with the computer and sat down. Tails watched as the hedgehog typed, getting a more serious expression as he did so. "Now then, play times over. Down to business, I don't wan't a word out of you for the next few minutes, or else" he finished with a sharper tone. Tails looked around awkwardly for the next fifteen minutes. "Now, I need information from you. If you chose not to cooperate with me", He stood up from his chair and walked over to a tool box and pulled out a a little drill. "You don't wan't to know what will happen" he said quietly. Tails gulped nervously, he was shaking from the sight of that tool and the others he got a quick peek at in the box. "First and most important question, are you going to cooperate and answer the questions, and with that said, where are the rest of the chaos emeralds?" the shadow knight said

 **Tails POV**

This is bad, he want's to know where the chaos emeralds are, and I know where they all are. If I lie and say I don't know where they are, he could test me with a lie detector. He's got a lot of fancy equipment, whose to say a lie detector isn't one of them. I can't tell him though, if he gets all the chaos emeralds, he could do anything with them. No I won't tell anything, I'm strong! **What about the drill?** I don't care. **You do care**. Shut up. **I can't, I'm you.** This is confusing me! **Tough.** I don't care what you say, I'm not putting the entire planet in danger because of a silly little drill that's a bit sharp. **Very sharp.** Fine, very sharp, still doesn't matter, I'm not a rat! **That's a small drill...** Yeah, so. **You Do realise what he could do with that, right?**

 **Normal POV**

Tails whole body froze, and his eyes went wide, " The chaos emeralds are underneath where the master emerald used to be! Tails shouted at the top of his lungs. The Shadow Knight fell off his chair in shock. He got back up slowly, "What the heck! Your lucky I'm in a good mood now, what took you so long? The Shadow Knight asked bitterly. "Nothing" Tails said quickly, " I get to go now, right." said Tails eagerly. The Shadow Knight laughed, "I didn't say I'd let you go, you got off a punishment, that's all. Your going to be here for a long time I'm afraid, get cosy. I'm leaving now, but don't worry I'll point my computer at you and have the TV playing through it, that's your reward." said the Shadow Knight blankly. He turned on the TV and left the room. Tails looked at the TV. Next we have new Love Island. Tails groaned loudly "You said I wasn't getting a punishment! Get back here and change the channel!" Tails shouted. Tails then looked at the floor sadly. Here he was complaining about the program when he just gave the chaos emeralds away. Knuckles doesn't stay up there anymore, he'll get them easily. He'll have more power than a God in the palm of his hands, and it's all my fault. Tails couldn't hold it in any longer, he burst into tears, he let everyone down. He was too afraid of getting hurt himself, that he let the world take it for him. Tails finally realized something, he wasn't just being weak, he was being selfish, letting others take the fall to protect himself from getting hurt. "I'm not a hero, I'm a coward" Tails said in between sobbing. Tails let his body lay lifeless against the restraints as he continued to sob.

Tails suddenly heard the door open. It had been five hours since he had been stuck to the wall, and he was bored out of his life. The laptop went into sleep mode after a half an hour, so Tails was left doing nothing for the four and a half hours. Now Tails wasn't impatient like some of his other friends, in fact Tails was very patient. However this was just too much for him too handle, his body had gotten so stiff and his arms and legs hurt so much because of how tight the restraints were. "Now then , where were we. I remember, I was going to get you to help me with something. You wouldn't mind helping me would you, not that you have a choice mutant", the Shadow Knight said with a cheeky grin.

"I'm not a mutant, you, you, MONSTER!" Tails shouted angrily, ignoring the consequences of his outburst. The Shadow Knight looked shocked at him. He had not expected this kind of hostility. Tails had straight away regret his words. If he had just said he was not a mutant, it might not have been too bad, but he had also insulted him as well. Tails knew he was in big trouble now. Tails grew increasing scared as he walked towards him slowly. What happened next Tails never could have guessed. The Shadow Knight pressed a button and Tails fell down on to the floor. "Ow!" Tails yelped, as he came down on his wrists too hard. He tried to get up, but his body whole body was so stiff. He fell back against the wall holding his wrists in pain. "Get up weakling, now!", The Shadow Knight said angrily. Tails tried to, but fell back down again. The Shadow Knight walked over to him annoyed at the "act" his prisoner was putting on. He was about to to give him a hard punch to the face, when he noticed Tails was getting teary. He then saw the bruising on Tails arms and legs were really bad. "Hey, are you okay?" he asked. Tails looked up surprised. Is he... Worried, about me, i'm thinking crazy thoughts, he hates me, but it sounded like he was actually concerned about my well being. "I can't get up " Tails said. The Shadow Knight said nothing for a few seconds, then he quickly scooped Tails up, bridal style. "I'll carry you to your workstation" , the Shadow Knight said. Tails looked up at him curiously. He could have choose to drag me, throw me to the my destination or hold me in any other position, but he choose the most comfortable position to soften the weight on my sore muscles. It must by a coincidence, after all, he did pick him up quickly. It still was nice of him though. "Thanks. For lifting me over to my, eh, work area", Tails said smiling slightly as he did so. The Shadow looked at him for a second before quickly turning his head away, "Your such a weakling", he dropped Tails on a chair and went to leave the room. If you get worse, press this button", the Shadow Knight said pointing to a button beside the laptop on his work desk, before continuing, "I need you in good shape to do this work. The list is there beside you, saying what I want done on the computer. If you attempt to escape this room, you will be in big trouble, that I can assure you. I trust you not to be foolish, so I won't tie you to the chair.

Tails looked at the sheet over and over again. He couldn't believe what he was reading. "This isn't possible... It can't be."Oh, it is possible, and your going to make the last few modifications." The Shadow Knight said with a smile. Tails shocked expression only became bigger as he kept reading all the workings on the project. "Who could have possibly made this!?" Tails said as looked at the work as if it weren't real. The Shadow Knights smile turned into a huge grin. "I did"

Tails couldn't believe what he was hearing, but it sounded true, "Your lying". "You just can't accept the fact that someone challenges your intelligence." The Shadow Knight said. Tails had no come back to that, He left, leaving Tails to his work. As soon as Tails touched the mouse, a voice spoke from the computer. "State the project you wish to work on" the voice said.

Tails sighed," the Time Machine."

evah enod sliaT I dengis tahw


	11. Chapter 11 The Fallout

**Chapter 14 The Fallout**

Knuckles flung a chair at the wall. "Knuckles, calm down!" Amy shouted angrily, "your wrecking my furniture!". "I don't care! All the chaos emeralds are gone! I checked them yesterday, just like I do once a week, but they were gone. Now Eggman has only one chaos emerald left to get, which that other creep took from us", said Knuckles bitterly. Actually we gave it to him, remember," Silver said. "Yeah, but he tricked us which is the same thing in my book" replied Knuckles. Your just saying that because you get tricked by Eggman more often then you check the Chaos emeralds", said Amy laughing. Rouge and Cream joined in on it. This made Knuckles really mad. "You think this is funny?! While your laughing, Eggman has almost all the Chaos emeralds!". Silver stood up from his chair, "Knuckles is right, if Eggman gets the last emerald, who's to say what he could do with them, and we can't forgot about the six he has along with the master emerald. He could supercharge the robot we all hate at the moment. The Egg driller. If he adds the other chaos emeralds to it along with the Master emerald",Silver sighed "he would be unstoppable".

Everyone stopped talking at that comment. Then things started to go bad. "Wait a sec, it was your fault we lost the chaos emerald to that creep! Blaze said angrily pointing at Amy. Amy looked at Blaze, shocked. My fault! I was trying to save Tails and Cream" Amy said. "You did a great job at it, we were going to think of a better solution, but you rushed us, causing the mistake in the first place. We didn't even get Tails back, we only got Cream." Blaze said, her palms heating up. "Are you saying Cream isn't important" Amy said shocked.

With in a few minutes, everyone was at each others throats. "Of course it was your fault Knuckles! You should have been watching the emeralds" Rouge said poking Knuckles in the nose. "WHAT! Knuckles shouted so loudly, it silenced everyone else's arguments. "YOU were the one that told me I needed to socialise and stop being a, "Knuckle head", you, you stupid BITCH!"

Everyone in the room gasped. "I don't care what any of you think, iv'e had enough of you all. Especially you rouge the rat! In fact, Iv'e had enough of being apart of your little group. I never get the respect I deserve! I QUIT!" Knuckles said turning to leave. Before anyone could saying anything he slammed the door behind him, almost breaking the hinges. Everyone was going to run after him, but no one moved first. Knuckles words seemed to hit everyone hard. "you know what, I quit too" Amy said sadly. She walked out the door with Cream following behind her. Cream looked back at the others, before running off to catch up with Amy. Rouge stood up to leave. "Not you too" Silver said. "Relax, I'm just leaving. Besides, I'm not really apart of this group anyway. I'm just here a lot because maybe your search for the creep, as were calling him, could send me in the right direction to finding Shadow. Your at a dead end though, so I'm leaving to search for Shadow on my own, good luck, Rouge said giving Silver and Blaze quick kisses on the cheeks, before leaving.

Silver and Blaze looked at Rouge leave. "Guess it's just me and you Silver, like old times," Blaze said. Silver sighed loudly, "yeah, I guess so" Silver said quietly sitting down. It was quiet for the next few seconds until Sliver realised something. "Wait a minute. We don't live here, Silver said

Tails had been working hard for two weeks without any sleep, he had been warned that if he didn't finish the job soon he was a dead fox. Tails appearance had changed a lot over the short two weeks. His fur was covered in oil and sweat, because of this, his fur had gotten a lot darker. His eyes no longer had a bright blue colour, but a more dim look to them. The lack of sleep had caused bags to form under his eyes. There was no shower in the room. Outside of it, maybe, but he was told not to leave the room, and he did as he was told. His captor had not come back since he was left to work. He was left a few pieces of bread to eat, but with his hunger from working so hard, the bread lasted only three days, Tails now regret not saving it. He was so hungry, he could eat anything. Tails knew he couldn't go on much longer, he couldn't concentrate, he also felt like there was a hole in his stomach. Unfortunately, the lack of sleep didn't just affect his work, he had started hallucinating a few days ago, he felt like everything was falling apart. He needed to be out of this room, and fast.

The door opened and a familiar body walked. "How's the work coming along? You should be done now. Where are you?" Said the Shadow Knight looking around. Tails slowly got up off the ground, he grabbed the table for support and pulled himself up. Tails looked at him half asleep. Tails vision was fuzzy. His body wobbled as he tried to focus on the person in front of him.

"I- I'm almost... finished...sir" Tails mumbled weakly. "Good, now we have... The Shadow Knight stopped, and looked at Tails whole body. He made a homeless person look clean... "You look, terrible." The Shadow Knight said. Tails opened his eyes, "what?" He said sleepily. The Shadow Knight said nothing. He looked at Tails again more closely. Suddenly he ran around Tails and waked him on the back of the head lightly. Tails fell like a brick.

Tails opened his eyes, closing them quickly after getting a bright light shining at them. He opened them again slowly, adjusting to the light. He was laying on fresh green grass. He sat up slightly looking ahead. He saw a beautiful waterfall with water washing up against the grass, tickling his toes lightly, his toes? He didn't remember having his shoes and socks off, it doesn't matter, his mind was so disoriented, who knows what he was doing...

He looked beside him and saw the Shadow Knight standing a bit away from him with his arms folded. Tails looked at him for a while and then back at the waterfall. "Why did you br- bring me here" Tails asked. The Shadow Knight said nothing, so Tails waited patiently for the next minute or two for an answer.

The Shadow Knight sighed, "you've been working too hard. Your body is suffering because of this. You haven't slept, have you?". Tails opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. "You look very hungry, how much were you given to eat?" the Shadow Knight asked curiously. Tails looked at him oddly, "why are you asking, you...you were the one that ga-gave me the tiny amount." "I didn't leave out the food, that was my... other assistant. the Shadow Knight said taking a big pause in between. Tails stomach growled, "I'm s-so hu-hungry. Please give me something to eat, I can't lift another finger to do any more work without food." Tail said desperately getting on his knees basically begging his captor.

The Shadow Knight looked at Tails desperate face. He knelt down to Tails level. "How about this, since you been working so hard, you can have a day off work. Were going around and getting some food, anything you want to do, Sound good." the Shadow Knight said nicely. Tails couldn't help but smile happily at the thought of food. He mentally slapped himself, bad Tails, don't smile, you hate this guy. He is making you work without rest. He is letting me have a day off though. I don't want him to change his mind, I'm almost ready to escape, so I should just go with it. I'm still so hungry.

The Shadow Knight sniffed the air. "Before we go, take a bath. You smell like a sweaty garbage can. Look like one too. I'll meet you in the forest. I'll show a little respect and give you four minutes, not a minute later, got it." the Shadow Knight walked into the forest, slowly going out of view.

Tails watched as he left and than slowly put his foot into the shallow end. He then slipped his whole body in and relaxed, Tails sighed happily. This warm water would feel good on anyone's fur, but for Tails it was heaven. Unfortunately he was so tired, he could barely clean himself.

The Shadow Knight came back looking a little annoyed. "Are you done yet? I thought you were hungry." the Shadow Knight said impatiently, taping his foot. "Well... I'm having trouble washing myself. The stains are not coming out of my fur, I'm too tired to scrub them out" Tails said. The Shadow Knight shook his head. " What do you want me to do about it?" Tails went quiet for a moment. "Well... maybe, you could... um... scrub... m-my fur. Ju-just a little bit? Tails said turning his head away blushing. The Shadow Knight looked at Tails with a weird expression. You want me to, scrub your fur?", The Shadow Knight said. "I'm really need my fur clean. It's an emergency situation" replied Tails "I...um...I dunno bout that. I don't think it's an emergency" He said uncomfortably backing away from Tails slightly.

 **Tails POV**

WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING! I'm asking the bad guy to scrub my damn fur. What the hell is wrong with me? Does it have something to do with this whole experience? Am I going crazy? It's probably because I'm not a fan of having my fur smell or look like a walking bin. The only person I would have even considered asking something like this to would be Sonic... Not some evil hedgehog who kidnapped me and is making me work restlessly. Regardless, my fur needs scrubbing and he said this was the day I get to have my way, so he better scrub to it. Is that funny? **Of course it's funny.**

 **Normal POV**

Wait just a sec here, you said I could have my way today, and I need my fur clean. So, do you mind getting to it." said Tails said folding his arms with a smirk. The Shadow knight walked over to Tails slowly. He grabbed Tails arm and pulled him closer rather harshly. "Ow! Tails yelped, rubbing his arm with the other. The Shadow Knight lowered himself to Tails level, "I'm not giving your fur a scrub, what do you think I am, "your" prisoner. I'll let you off this time with a warning. I'd mind your tone in future. I may not be as forgiving next time" The Shadow Knight said seriously. Tails rubbed his hands together and looked at the ground, "sorry sir".

The Shadow Knight quickly brightened the mood and gave Tails a smile and a pat on the shoulder. "Come on. Lets have some food and enjoy ourselves. You need to relax and have a good time. The rest of the day is still for you, and you alone. I still want respect though, got it." The Shadow Knight said with a grin. Tails gave a little smile and nodded. Tails followed The Shadow Knight out of the forest to get some food in the shop.

eceip ni dengis tser ezalB cinoS


	12. Chapter 12 A New Perspective

**A New Perspective**

Tails followed the Shadow Knight down a creepy looking street. Tails had no idea where they were. Everywhere he looked he saw people smoking, drinking alcohol, or just breaking stuff and doing graffiti on the walls. Tails had never been in any of these kind of places before, it was a horrible sight and for some reason everyone was giving him evil grins. It was like a horror movie scene. This place gave Tails cold shivers down his spine. No one looked nice down here.

"Um... Shadow Knight, sir, everyone's staring at me in a bad way" Tails said nervously. The Shadow Knight looked around and saw everyone looking at Tails, some were holding knives and other sharp objects. "Not tonight fella's, this one's not on the menu I'm afraid" The Shadow Knight said shooing them away, with a wave of his hand. They all groaned, and went back to their own business.

They continued walking seeing more of the same with the exception of a few expensive looking cars. Tails was surprised to see the cars hadn't been so much as dented, while most of the other worse cars had been broken into and a lot burned. This made no sense to Tails, but he decided against questioning it and continued on.

The further the went down this path, the more expensive cars they saw. Finally they turned a corner and saw a huge restaurant. Tails eyes widened in surprise. It was massive. It looked so out of place compared to all the other small broken houses and tiny shops, and it also had a really nice paint job, which the others couldn't say they had. It could easily be the most impressive restaurant Tails had ever seen.

"Whoa. That's an amazing restaurant. I bet the food is lovely." Tails said. "Well, your going to find out how nice it is because were eating in there." The Shadow Knight said with a smirk.

Tail couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Were eating in there?! It looks expensive". The Shadow Knight walked up to the building, motioning for Tails to follow him. "I assure you, this place is a lot more then expensive. Lets not discuss the price though, lets just have a nice meal and enjoy ourselves.

They entered the building. Tails jaw dropped. The place looked amazing from the outside, but the inside was a different story altogether. The whole place was painted a clear white. The room was huge and there was a stairs leading to another dining area no doubt. What caught Tails attention the most, was the magnificent fountain in the centre of the dining area. It had crystal clear water flowing out of it.

They walked up to the counter and saw a fancy looking waiter. "How may I help you today gentlemen" He said politely. He looked at Tails suspiciously for a few seconds before shrugging his shoulders.

"You can start by showing me to my reserved table" The Shadow Knight said impatiently. The waiter looked at the person standing beside Tails and dropped his pen. "Oh my, I didn't know it-it was you sir, I was more focused on your-your "friend". I-I'll get your table ready right away sir" The waiter said quickly going upstairs.

The Shadow walked upstairs followed by Tails. They went up two pairs of stairs before reaching the top floor. Each floor had a fountain but the top floor had a massive one. They saw the waiter quickly fix there table before leaving in a hurry. They walked over to the table and sat down. It was a very big table, suited to much more then two people.

Tails still couldn't believe any of this. It was like the dream he had when he became a famous mechanic and was rich and went to the restaurant similar to this place, except it wasn't as big. The Shadow Knight put his arms behind his neck and put his feet up and relaxed. Tails sat in the chair awkwardly. It was all so amazing, he didn't know how to react. Even the chair was extremely comfortable.

The waiter brought over the food and a bottle of wine. He poured a glass for the both of them and left with a quick bow.

Tails looked at the wine glass in front of him with a little disgust. "I don't think I should be drinking wine". The Shadow Knight shook his head. "This wine is worth more then the waiter who brought it to you. Now start drinking." Tails gulped, he didn't want to be rude, but he didn't want to drink wine, he had no idea what it tasted like. He gave the glass a quick sniff before reluctantly picking it up and taking a sip. It had a sweet berry taste to it. Even with his advanced senses he couldn't smell or taste all the flavours, there were so many different one's.

" Sweet" Tails said smiling a little. The Shadow Knight gave him a big grin and chuckled, "I would hope so, that's not even the best here, intoxicating, isn't it though.

They both finished there meal in silence. Tails had ordered the lamb. He had only had lamb once before, and it was nothing compared to this. Lamb and Potato, covered in gravy. That was the simplest meal they had, most of the other meals were tiring to even say. The Shadow Knight had ordered some kind of Salmon dish. Both dishes were displayed really nicely.

The Shadow Knight wiped his mouth and chin before looking at Tails. "Now then. Lets get down to business." The Shadow Knight said. "Um, sure, but can I ask you something?"

"What?" The Shadow Knight said quickly. "Why is everyone still looking at me, were in a fancy restaurant

The Shadow Knight smiled, "I'll tell you in the limo, come on"

The Shadow Knight stood up and walked towards the door, followed by Tails. Tails mind had gotten sick of questioning things, and saying wow, so he just went with it.

The Shadow Knight left the wine bottle on the table. "Everyone dining in that restaurant are top dogs in the criminal world, and they don't like you very much, that's the nicest way of putting it. All of them in there would like nothing more then to snatch you up and have a party."

Tails eyes went wide. He couldn't believe it. Everyone in there was a criminal boss, the filth of the world he had once heard someone call them.

"What do they have against me?" The Shadow Knight laughed lightly, "everything Tails, everything. If any one of them got their hands on you, he he he, they could have so much fun. Tell the public your their prisoner, hold you for ransom, or just slice every little bit of fur right off your body." The Shadow Knight said, ending in a darker tone. Tails holl body shivered at the thought. "What's stopping them, their criminals right?" Tails dared to say

The Shadow Knight grinned, "Because your with me, that's the only reason. Now then, on to bigger and better things". The Shadow Knight grabbed the wine bottle and poured himself and Tails a glass. "No sipping crap this time, gulp it down in one go, like this. The Shadow Knight said gulping the whole glass down quickly. He folded his arms and looked at Tails. Tails looked at the wine glass and gulped. He had hoped he wouldn't notice that he had only taken three sips. No such luck, unfortunately. Three sips wasn't too bad, but gulping down the whole glass? Tails did not want to do that. However, he didn't really have a choice in the matter.

Pushing his thoughts aside, he grabbed the glass and gulped it down as fast as he could. He didn't stop until the glass was empty. He put the glass down and coughed for a couple of seconds. The Shadow Knight grinned again and chuckled. "That's more like it. Now we can have a good time. Ignore everything that's going on in the world and just relax.

The Shadow Knight filled Tails glass up again and put it in front of him. "A few more drinks can ensure you do."The Shadow Knight said

Tails looked down at the glass. He rubbed his stomach. Well, I'm already down the rabbit hole, there's no turning back now. Tails grabbed the glass and drank it, and another, and another, and another... and that's about as much as Tails remembered...

tuohtiw sereht dengis on uoy eguoR kraps


	13. Chapter 13 The Broken Man

**Chapter 16**

It was late at night. Silver and Blaze were in their house, sitting in front of the fire. It was a cold night. A very quiet night too. The cold wind blowing and the crackling of the fire were the only things to be heard. Silver and Blaze sipped on their mugs of hot chocolate. It was a stressful time for them. Too many things had been happening at once, it was hard to get on top of them all. Eggman had quieted a little too much lately, which they knew was always a bad thing, not to mention the thought of him having six of the Chaos emeralds and Master emerald would scare just about anyone. Then there was the Shadow Knight. Silver had looked hard, but could not get any info on him. With no information to guide him, he was forced to accept that looking around randomly for Tails was going to get them nowhere. They had no Chaos emeralds to bait him with either. Crime rates in the city had increased a lot, along with further investigations of police bribery. Silver had hoped that their friends would forgive and forget, but they were not joking around. They were done with the hero role. Silver and Blaze had mentally been stranded in a pit of unanswered questions. This was when Tails had shinned in the past. He had a cool, composed train of thought under pressure. Silver was smart too, but he was no where near as smart as Tails. Silver felt as though everything was falling apart. In reality though, besides the increased crime rates, the world wasn't falling apart. Eggman and The Shadow Knight hadn't done anything world changing, yet. His friends had changed though. It's as if they didn't care anymore. What had happened to the unstoppable group they once were. What happened to them...

Somewhere unknown to the public, a government weapons lab were working on their greatest weapon yet...

"Gather round, fine gentlemen! You are about to witness a break through in weaponry!." First however, let me introduce myself, I am Doctor Gorro, head of the weapons research here. I am original from Russia, but I found a place here I could really call home. Enough about that though. I have something very special to show you". Doctor Gorro led the group of people into a small room with the equipment already set out. Everyone gathered around the table, taking seats.

Doctor Gorro fiddled around on the computer for a few seconds before pulling the cloth off the table, revealing a small replica of a tank. "This is a replica of a tank, as you can see. Similar to the models you have at the moment. We have come a long way in building heavily armoured tanks, able to withstand quite a bit of heavy fire, but as our technology here grows, so does the enemy's. Eggman's tech is still much ahead of ours, but with the sheer amount of resources we have compared to him, we should now be able to overpower his machinery. I think i have kept you all waiting long enough, so here it is!" Doctor Gorro pressed a button on his laptop. Almost instantly an energy shield appeared around the tank. Everyone stood up from their seats, waking up from their lazy state. Some blinked their eyes a couple of times, while others just looked around it curiously.

"Yes, yes, take a good look. If you haven't figured it out yet, it's an energy shield, very powerful. Some of our finest work here, if I do say so myself", said Doctor Gorro giving a little bow. Everyone finally regained their composer, and with it, questions arose.

"Is this, energy shield as you call it, really effective?" asked the president

I assure you Mr President, it would have been an insult to you if we had not tested it. I can't say it's unbreakable, unfortunately, but I can say it's very powerful. It's able to withstand a lot of fire and quite a few rockets, before something breaks through, but if this energy shield was applied to every tank, it would change the outcome on the battlefield significantly, as well as fewer casualties." Doctor Gorro finished.

It was quiet for a few seconds as the group had small mutters among themselves. "This all sounds great, but what would happen if the enemy got their hands on this technology. It could be used against us." asked one of the politicians.

Doctor Gorro smiled and pulled out a small control panel out of a drawer. "I'm glad you asked. I was too concerned about this, so I made this. This little control panel has all sorts of features that can shut down all of my energy shields. The best thing about it is, it can shut down only the shields you want it too. If any one stole any designs from here and replicated our work, we could shut down all their shields, if they attacked using them. This is as safe as it gets. I'm trusting you, Mr President, with the control panel, do keep it safe." Doctor Gorro said handing the control panel to him.

Everyone happily agreed on this, shaking hands with the other scientists and workers, everything was going great. The big sum of money they needed badly, was about to be signed, until someone asked a question.

"What would happen if they stole the control panel?"

Just a second after he said that, something smashed straight through the roof, breaking the table. The dust cleared and the Shadow Knight jumped off the broken wood. "I can answer that! First, they'd do this!" the Shadow Knight said throwing a smoke bomb on the floor. The smoke covered the hole room, causing everyone to cough harshly. "Then they'd grab this little gadget!" he yanked the control panel out of the Presidents hand. "And then he'd give this little rich prick a right hook!" He smashed his fist into one of the politicians jaw knocking him across the room, putting him out cold. And he'd finish with this! He snapped the control panel in two with his knee. He threw the two pieces on the ground and jumped threw the roof, creating another hole. Security burst threw the door, only to find a lot of injured people and a very angry Gorro. "Curse you, you blasted mutant! I'll just make another, you, you black armoured, hedgehog thing!" He shouted angrily putting his fist to the sky.

It turns out, it was not as easy as he hoped it would be. That night and the next morning, the whole place was checked. The feedback was not positive... They had been wiped clean. Anything related to the energy shield project was gone. The more news Doctor Gorro heard about files lost and designed shields being destroyed, made him more and more angry. The next night he sat in his office holding his head tightly. He banged his head off the table and muttered angrily to himself for the rest of the night.

revir, ll'I ho yrc a dengis em ti ni worht ? uoy tsuj


	14. Chapter 14 Recovery

**Chapter 17 Recovery**

Tails slowly lifted his eyes open, his eyes felt heavy and weak. As he finally got them open, he immediately shut them again. The light burned his eyes. He opened them even slower, his eyes trying to adjust to the high amount of light. He then blinked his eyes a few times and sat up slowly. He finally started to wake up. He looked around the room while giving his eyes a few quick rubs. His was in a fairly big room, mostly consisting of white colours. He was in a very big bed, king sized. He stretched his arms and legs and gave a quick yawn before slowly lifting himself off the bed and onto the floor. With a little wobbling and stumbling, he eventually found his two socks and shoes in the giant room. His head finally showed a little brain activity and he started to wonder where he was.

"Owww, my head hurts" Tails moaned. "Where am I, what's going on, and why does my head and stomach fell so bad, especially my stomach", Tails said hugging his stomach tightly. It wasn't the most pleasant feeling. Tails shook his head and walked to the door. He was confused and weak, but sitting in what looked to be a hotel room, wasn't going to get him anywhere, outside that door and beyond were answers he needed. He opened the door and looked to his left and right. His intuition had been correct. He saw numbered doors. He walked over to the elevator and pushed the button. He got inside and the elevator door closed. Tails was starting to feel more awake by now and he tried to recall why he was here.

 **Tails POV**

Timeout Tails! Found myself in a hotel room, door unlocked for some reason, disoriented and weak. That's mostly it. That doesn't help. Wait! That Shadow Knight guy, I was with him in the limo. We talked... and talked... and then I drank five glasses of wine. What have I done. I could've drank more then that for all I know! My memory is completely black after that. What was I thinking!? Oh right, I wasn't. Well, the elevator stopped, I better get a move on.

 **Normal POV**

The elevator door opened and Tails spotted The Shadow Knight talking to the receptionist. He looked over and saw Tails walking towards him. "Well if it isn't furry face. How'd you sleep?" He asked with a chuckle. Tails yawned again before speaking, "I don't feel like I got any" Tails said weakly.

The Shadow Knight smirked, "sounds accurate. I know from the look on your face that you don't know what happened last night. I would like to tell you, but I would much prefer you find out yourself, or forget it ever happened, either way I don't care." The Shadow Knights face went hard. "I'm afraid to say your little so called vacation ends now. Remember, this never happened. I don't wan't you talking to anyone about this, not even me. I know your tired from last night, so you can sleep on the way back. Four hours should be well enough for you to get your mind straight and finish your work. Now come along, or limo awaits."

The Shadow Knight walked outside and into the limo followed by Tails. It took less than five minutes for Tails to fall asleep.

The Next week was torture for Tails. His Captor was meaner then usual. He wanted things done fast. When he stayed to check on progress he was demanding and cruel. He was so mean all of a sudden. Sure he was the bad guy trying to take over the world, or something along the lines. But he was so nice on his break. He must take work very seriously.

Tails had finally finished his work and was glad. He was exhausted. It didn't need much work on it, just very delicate work. He was lucky too. He was told if it wasn't done in the next two hours he was getting his hands cut off. That image got him to the finish line much quicker.

Tails sighed, "I'm done Mr Shadow Knight sir". The Shadow Knight took his legs off the table. "Took ya long enough. Now turn it on." Tails pressed a button on the control panel and watched as a portal begin to appear in the time machine.

"Yes, finally. I have waited for this moment for a very long time. I will let you in on a little secret, fox, it doesn't just travel through time. It can travel across the multiverse!"

Tails gasped. "No way! Wait a second. Why is it called a time machine then. It does more then that." The Shadow Knight smashed his hand on the table angrily. "I don't remember asking for your opinion, nor did I say you could open your cheeky little mouth! Your still a prisoner. Now give me the control pad! The Shadow Knight shouted.

Tails through the control pad and backed away from him. "S-sorry s-sir" Tails said quietly

"That's better! Now I'm off to mess with time and space, there's a bit of food left in the drawer, I think" the S Knight said before jumping into the portal.

Tails watched as the portal closed. This was his chance. Tails opened one of the drawers and pulled out a small bomb. Tails had been waiting for this moment ever since he arrived here. He had hoped the S Knight being a bad guy and all, would have some kind of explosive materials lying around. He was right, and using this along with other spare parts for the time machine, he was able to build a small bomb, in the hopes of blowing open the metal door.

Tails attached the bomb to the handle and took cover. He pressed the button. The bomb went off blowing open the door and half the room with it.

Tails opened his eyes to see half the table gone. " A little too close for comfort, but I'm free!" Tails jumped up the air and flew towards freedom. The alarm went off as soon as Tails exited the room. Tails smirked, "Can't get notifications about your prisoners escaping in another universe".

Tails flew out of the falling building at full speed. "maybe I overdid it a little". The building exploded behind him. "Nope, just right" Tails laughed.

 **Tails POV**

Why am I laughing? I built him a machine that can warp through time and space. Who knows what'll happen! I've really messed this up. But I had no choice, right? No, I had a choice, I could have fought him, even if I died trying. But I didn't, did I. I'm a coward...

 **Normal POV**

Tails flew back to Silver's house to warn him about the Time machine. Tails dropped down in front of his door and knocked a few times. Silver opened the door.

"How can I help you?" Silver said before realising who was standing in front of him.

TAILS! Your back! What happened to you, how'd you escape!" Silver said with a shocked look on his face.

Tails smiled. "I blew up the prison, so I guess you could say I made an explosive exit" Tails said with a wink.

Silver looked awkwardly at Tails for a few moments. "That's great! But umm... that didn't really do it for me, with the wink and all."

"Really, not at all?"

"Sorry Tails. Stick to being a genius, okay."

Tails ears dropped, "Oh... okay then. Well... anyway, I need to talk to you and Blaze. It's very important so we'll need to go inside. It's also kinda cold" Tails rubbed his hands together and panted a little.

"Okay then, come on in" Silver let Tails in and closed the door behind him. "how important is it? Is it about Eggman or that Shadow Knight guy?"

Tails said nothing

"Eh... Tails?"

Tails looked up directly into Silver's eyes. "I made the worst time of villain. One that can travel through time...

si nelots eht sa rewop desubA dengis emas rewop ?


	15. Chapter 15 Portal Problems

**Chapter 18 Portal Problems**

The rest of the day Tails, Silver and Blaze were working on a way to stop The Shadow Knight. None of their other friends came to help. Knuckles was still on angel island and refused to help them out. Rouge was still looking for Shadow and left them no way to get in touch with her. Amy slammed the door in their face. The only one who came was Cream, but she wasn't really helping as much as she was watching. She baked cookies for them though, so she did help a bit. Tails was most happy with this, he loves cookies.

It was midnight when they finished. Tails walked Cream home because it was very late for her, Tails was tired as well.

Cream yawned "What time is it Tails?" she asked.

"Its half twelve" Tails responded. Cream rubbed her eyes.

"So how you gona stop... the bad... guy, thing"? Cream said sleepily.

"Well, since no one other then him can open the portal with voice recognition, we'll be waiting for him with a trap!" Tails said rubbing his nose with a smile. Cream's face went sad and her smile went.

"I remember someone who used to do that" Cream said sadly before walking up to her house. Tails put his hands down and watched Cream be hugged by her Mom before going inside.

"I didn't... know " Tails said sadly. Tails didn't do anything for a few seconds before walking off. Tails got home and through himself on the coach and turned on the TV. Tails laid his head on the couch and flicked to the news channel. The news showed reports of an attack by eggman to a fleet of ships. Another two shops robbed and protests held for the freedom fighters to stop eggman and help the people. Tails jumped up from the couch when he heard of sightings of a weird hedgehog in metal armour.

 **Tails POV**

WHAT! That's impossible! I have to check the time machine right now! I flew off towards the building. I arrived and saw the time machine in pieces on the floor. Oh... I completely forgot I blew this up. Wait a sec. I ran over to the control panel only to see it smashed. How did he get back! How could I have been such an idiot. I wasted Silver and Blaze's time. What is wrong with me? **Don't ask me.** It was a rhetorical statement. **You should go home and get rest. Your tired.** Don't tell me what I already know!

 **Normal POV**

Tails shook his head and flew back to his house. He turned off the TV, that he'd clumsily left on and went upstairs into his bed and fell asleep.

Eggman and The Shadow Knight stood on Angel island, where the master emerald used to be.

"This is the spot right? The spot you felt the high energy? Eggman asked. The Shadow Knight simply nodded in response. A portal suddenly appeared on the shrine. Eggman laughed, and punched the air

"Yes! Now I can enter the portal and hopefully find a way to get back into the portal from my ship. First order of business, S Knight, find the person who made this and bring them to me, so we can have a little 'chat'. Eggman grinned.

The Shadow Knight jumped into the portal, leading him to the same location previously used. He appeared a few metres off the ground and landed smoothly. He looked around for a few seconds before spotting where he was. He had been transported to Angel island in the future. Eggman had told him it would lead him into the future, in the same spot previously used, but nothing else. Most off the trees were broken and burnt. The stairs leading up to the master emerald was half broken. The master emerald itself was gone too.

He ignored the destroyed environment and took out a heat seeking device and searched deeper into the forest. After picking up a signal, he quickly sped through the forest towards it.

He arrived at a waterfall and looked around carefully, trying to pinpoint the source. He spotted Knuckles come out from behind a tree with a spear in his hand.

"Knuckles? No way you built a time machine. Bring me to the creator, or you die. The Shadow Knight said darkly. Knuckles looked at the Shadow Knight and dropped his spear.

"You" Knuckles said angrily. "I'M GOING TO KILL YOU, YOU SON OF A BITCH" Knuckles shouted, charging at the Shadow Knight. The Shadow Knight jumped over Knuckles head. Knuckles turned around and ran full speed at him again, throwing punches everywhere. The Shadow Knight dodged a few but got punched in the face a couple of times. He sidestepped out of the way and jumped into a ball, homing attacking Knuckles in the head. Knuckles fell to the ground and got hit with three more homing attacks before The Shadow Knight backed off.

"Give it up Knuckles. Last chance to tell me where the creator is, or Eggman will tear your brain apart until it gets the information he wants."

Knuckles got up slowly on one knee. He growled and charged at him again. The Shadow Knight jumped up in the air and shot chaos spears at Knuckles, creating a small hole where Knuckles was running. The dust cleared and Knuckles was motionless on the ground with multiple scars and wounds. The Shadow Knight abandoned his search and decided to bring future Knuckles back to Eggman.

The Shadow Knight walked into the control room of Eggman ship and dropped Knuckles on the ground.

"Nice work Shadow Knight. You may leave till further use for you shows itself." Eggman said. The Shadow Knight nodded and left the control room. Eggman left the room and came back with a bottle of water. Eggman opened it and poured it all over Knuckles head.

Knuckles eyes shot open and he shook his head wildly "Wha, hell goin on, why am I soaked!" Knuckles spat out angrily. As soon as he saw Eggman, he lunged at him. Eggman pressed a button giving Knuckles a high voltage shock.

"Ahh!" Knuckles screamed. He fell weakly to the floor. Eggman laughed.

Eggman's shock collar! Now with waterproof features. For all your pesky little rodents! Eggman said while doing a little goofy dance.

Eggman coughed " Ahem. Anyway, long story short, you work for me now. Any struggle against the collar by you or anyone, will result in a shock five times as powerful as that, killing you. So be a good little rodent and you won't have to die. Now then, would you kindly follow the robot on your left to your cage." Eggman said with a wave of his hand, dismissing Knuckles. Eggman sat back in his chair and went back to work on his computer.

Knuckles growled angrily and clenched his fists together. His whole body shook with anger. "I am not a rodent, nor am I parrot!" Eggman pressed a button. Knuckles fell through the trapdoor and landed in his cell.

"A parrot?. You wish." said Eggman before going back to his work.

Tails led Silver, Blaze, Amy and Cream over to the ruins of the time machine.

"Why did I come again" Amy said quickly, looking away from the group.

"Because when I came over, you were 'bored'." Tails said awkwardly. Amy blushed and said no more.

Knuckles was high above them, slowly gliding his way down. He landed and walked over to join them.

"Knuckles? You said if we asked you to help us with anything, we'd be your punching bags for the day"

I did say that Tails. I'm glad you get it now. This isn't about that though, I'm here because I got a really bad headache a while ago, and when I went for a walk I felt a lot of chaos energy coming from here, so I came to see what it was and well, you know the rest" Knuckles explained.

"Well, it's good to have you here Knuckles. I have to admit, I really missed you with us Knuckles. Your really important to the group. We need you now more then ever Knuckles." Tails said smiling. Knuckles had a shocked look on his face. "Thanks Tails, really. I needed that." Knuckles said smiling slightly.

"Guys, as touching as this moment is, I have to break it, we need to focus." Silver said with serious look. Knuckles and Tails nodded.

"Okay, the thing is, the time machine is gone, right. However, even though the actually machine is broken, the portal will still bring him back to the same spot. In other words, what I'm saying is, nothing changed. The plan's still on." Tails said.

"Good, so are we just going to overwhelm him as soon as he comes back." Silver asked.

"Yap" Tails said. Knuckles shook his head, facepalming. I could have made a better plan than that, Knuckles thought to himself.

All of sudden, there was a huge blast of energy, blasting all of the group away from the portal. The portal fully appeared, letting off a huge light. Everyone put their hands above their eyes.

"What's going on!" Knuckles shouted while trying to adjust to the light. Finally the light dimmed and a hedgehog stepped through the portal. He smirked at them and cracked his neck.

"Well well, now this, was unexpected. It matters not though.

Everyone got into a fighting stance. Knuckles jumped up from the rubble and got right in the Shadow Knights face.

"I'll wipe that smirk right off your face. Now give back all the emeralds you stole! Maybe then we won't beat the crap out of you so much. Knuckles said grabbing the Shadow Knight by the throat. The Shadow Knight relaxed and let his arms and legs dangle.

"That hurts sooo much" The Shadow Knight said mockingly. Knuckles growled angrily and lifted his arm up.

Just as Knuckles was about to punch, a ship came out from the clouds with an Eggman symbol.

"Eggman" Tails, Amy and Cream shouted.

Eggman walked out of the ship and looked curiously at The Shadow Knight.

"How did you get here so fast? You told me you were cleaning robots. Why are you letting Knuckles choke you?. Break that hold and pound him!" shouted Eggman through a microphone. The Shadow Knight did nothing. Eggman looked at him confused.

"PUNCH HIM! KICK HIM! Headbutt him? Is this thing working?" Eggman fiddled with the microphone, "Hello, hello? I can hear this loud, can you guys? Hey, i'm serious, come on guys, I need feedback here!"

Tails rolled his eyes, "oh jeez"

Rouge was flying in the sky when she heard the commotion. She flew down to the ground and hid behind some rocks. "It's a shame really. I didn't bring any popcorn" she whispered to herself laughing quietly.

The portal began to increase in power and was starting to sent little electric shocks around. Everyone was so busy wondering what the hell to do, no one noticed the portal getting slightly bigger. Finally Tails started to notice the portal was unstable, but it was too late. Suddenly the portal starting sucking everything with a tremendous amount of force. It happened so quickly that no one had a second to react. In a matter of seconds, everyone one had been sucked into the portal. Rouge, being further away had a better chance, but she too got sucked in with the rest.

The ship door opened and a hedgehog walked out. He immediately started to get sucked in. His reactions were fast though. He grabbed on to the ship door and held on with a strong grip. "They must have gotten sucked in to the portal. I wonder why the portals doing this? I need to get in there and help Eggman, he has no bots with him". He let go and flew through the air by the wind. Shadow knight slipped in just as the portal was closing...

lewej thgir won neve a dengis ym mraw eguor traeh tnow


	16. Chapter 16 Trapped in Time

**Chapter 19 Trapped in Time**

Everyone finally woke up after the shock from the unstable portal. Everyone was floating in a weird colourful place with weird, unnatural gravity. They were stuck in some kind of endless dimension. Eggman and the Shadow Knight parted from the group, but soon found themselves back with the group. They had not got lost. They had went in a complete straight line. As soon as the group was out of sight behind them, they appeared again in front of them. Everyone tried different ways and tricks to try and get out, but they all ended back in their little area.

After a about an hour they gave up and floated in their own respective areas. Eggman sighed as he sat in the air.

"Hey Tails, your smart like me, help a genius out eh. Eggman asked the fox.

"As much as I would 'love' to help you egghead, were stuck. Tails said as he floated past Eggman, slowly spinning upside down. Tails put his hand to his chin in deep thought until suddenly something clicked inside of him.

"Wait a minute Eggman, The Shadow Knight was the one that basically made this time machine, and he has his own control pad despite the physical time machine being destroyed!" Tails said pointing at the Shadow Knight. Everyone turned to look at the Shadow Knight accusingly.

Eggmans jaw dropped, "WHAT! You built a time machine and didn't tell me! How did you get the time to build this without me knowing. Explain!" Eggman said getting really annoyed. Eggman disliked a lot of things, but traitors in his own enforcement keeping things from him. That was not acceptable.

"Listen Doc, I am fully loyal to you, I would not disobey you, It's impossible. You have the wrong hedgehog I'm afraid. Before I came out, I spotted another hedgehog who looked just like. He was being held up by Knuckles" the Shadow Knight finished. Eggman thought about it for a while. He knew it was the truth. The mind control device on Shadow was perfect in design, flawless. Now that he thought about it, the other hedgehog didn't respond to his commands.

After a deep thought he came to a conclusion. "You are right, there has been deception taking place that I was not aware of. Clearly this 'other' Shadow Knight somehow got the design of the armour and replicated it. Yes, it makes sense now. He was able to make the time machine too, he must be a genius mechanic.

Everyone had to agree with Eggman, his logic was solid. Tails did have one thing to say though, "Ahem, I helped him make it. Not proud of it, but I have to point it out" said Tails.

"Quiet fox! No one cares. Did anyone think of anyway to get out of this hell hole while I was making that amazing speech?"

The group grunted in disgust. Knuckles went back to running upside down, looking for a way out.

Suddenly everyone was sucked into another portal. This place was different however. It looked like a real place with proper physics. Knuckles got up and growled angrily. "Stop sucking me into portals, I've had enough! Eggman, Tails, you claim to both be super smart. do something!"

"Calm down Knuckles. It doesn't matter how smart we are, without that control pad, were at the mercy of the random portals. Something must have happened to the control pad. I don't think that other Shadow Knight is behind us getting thrown through portals". Tails said. Knuckles started smashing the ground in frustration. Silver had been deep in thought since they got here. Himself and Tails had automatically taken the roles of leaders in the group, but he couldn't offer any support right now, his mind was everywhere and nowhere. He wasn't sure who the enemy was, and as hard as it was to admit, he didn't think Eggman was behind this. Then there was the two Shadow Knights. No answers on that subject. What about Shadow? Too many questions and no answers, that was the problem. Silver's mind had had enough.

"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!" Silver shouted randomly. Everyone looked at Silver strangely.

"Guys, you might want to see this." Tails said looking in the distance. Everyone joined Tails and saw Tails workshop in the distance.

"Wow Tails, I thought I lived away from civilisation, you live in an empty grass land." Knuckles said chuckling

"This isn't right. Its my workshop and house alright, but I don't live in an empty grassland. If there's a portal that leads out of here, it's in there" Tails said pointing to his house.

They walked through the empty area. No flowers or slightly different shades of grass, all the same. Eggman crossed his arms and sulked. He didn't like going with rodents on a little 'quest' to get home. He was a genius to the core and he was going to prove it. Eggman gradually moved away from the group with the Shadow Knight.

"Do you still have the electric dome trap I gave you. Eggman whispered to him. "Of course Eggman".

"Good, now listen closely" Eggman then whispered the plan to The Shadow Knight. He nodded and went ahead of the group. Then group did not notice him put down the trap when he pretended to trip. He gave a small nod to Eggman and proceeded to enter the house.

"Why did we walk again? It wasn't that far" asked Amy

I'm guessing its because Eggman's fat ass wouldn't have been able to move any other way" Knuckles answered for Tails.

"Why you disrespectful pest!" Shouted Eggman in anger. "I'm glad you'll be trapped here", he mumbled to himself.

The Shadow Knight watched through the window as they approached the trap. He had to time it perfectly. If he did it too soon, he would trap Eggman, if he did it too late, he could miss someone. Just as he saw Eggman leave the radius and Silver and Blaze enter it, he quickly pressed the button. The electric energy dome quickly surrounded the group from all sides.

Everyone gasped. " What's the meaning of this Eggman! Where all on the same team here! Tails shouted at Eggman.

"Ho ho ho ho. Your right, we were, but then I realised you were of no use to me. So I saw you were all in a nice little bundle and I took my chance. Don't blame me, blame yourself for being so stupid as to actually think I wouldn't double cross you. It's a shame you don't have Shadow with you." Eggman smirked at them. Tails growled at him from behind the electricity. "He would have known better" Eggman said smugly. Eggman did a little dance around the dome.

Everyone desperately tried to escape. They quickly realised how pointless it was. Not in a million years would they be able to break out. Silver fell to his kness and punched the floor, "how could we have been so stupid, how could I have been so stupid. I thought he was helpless without his gadgets, but I guess I keep forgetting. He's a genius, we were fools, and now we pay for it."

Blaze was shocked. She had seen the desperate side of Silver, but this was different. Silver was mentally out of steam and she knew it. The stress had gotten to him, she needed to take charge.

"Don't give up! We can still get out. We just need to... focus our attacks on one spot, that's all! Blaze went to work shooting fire balls at the dome. Tails got up off the ground. "Blaze it right. Lets do this!" Tails took out his energy blaster and started shooting the shield. Soon enough everyone had focused their attacks on a single spot.

Eggman laughed loudly. "Good luck with that, were going to leave now." He went into the house to join the Shadow Knight and to start searching for a portal. He walked into the living room and saw The Shadow Knight fighting with a robot plane. Eggman ducked into the hallway to avoid being crushed.

The Shadow knight dodged the planes rockets and ran upstairs. He went into the room above the living and spin dashed through the floor, going straight through the cockpit of the plane, practically slicing it in half. The plane sparked a bit before exploding. The Shadow Knight dusted himself off before going into the hallway to check if Eggman was okay.

Good job Shadow Knight, but eh, why was the plane on two legs and operating without a pilot?" Eggman asked. The Shadow Knight shrugged his shoulders.

Eggman and The Shadow Knight searched the house until they located the portal in the upstairs guest room. "You go first" Eggman said. The Shadow Knight nodded and jumped in. Eggman then walked in after him.

After a few minutes the portal automatically closed. The group continued pounding away at the shield, not knowing their only exit out, was gone.

Luck was on their side however. Eggman leaving the portal had deactivated the energy dome trapping them. Obviously the dome was not made to remain activated in a different dimension.

They group went inside and looked everywhere for the portal, but couldn't find it.

"No...it can't be... he took it. He took the portal and closed it. Were trapped here... Tails said falling to his knees. Cream hugged Amy tightly. Silver said nothing. Knuckles started smashing the walls, " LET US OUT", He smashed his fist into the television causing a small explosion.

"Knuckles. That's the only TV here. Thanks Knuckles, your just so smart aren't ya." Amy said.

Silver finally spoke up. "It's over guys, we lost. Silver walked out of the house leaving everyone in shock. Blaze wanted to follow him but couldn't. What was the point?

Hours went by. The night never came. The sound of the clock was the only sound heard by the second day. Ironically, the only sound they heard most of the time meant nothing, time meant nothing here.

Nothing did.

snroht dengis a si epoh ? esor gnoma


	17. Chapter 17 Looking into the Past

**Chapter 20 Looking into the Past**

The Shadow Knight laughed loudly while looking at an image of the freedom fighters sitting hopelessly in the house. He spun around his chair slowly, observing all the different portals.

"So many dimensions, all in the palm of my hand! I want to change something, I can. I want to move something, I can. I want annoying heroes trapped, it's done. On this occasion however, eggman did it for me. Unfortunately for Eggman, he isn't getting back to mobius either. They'll all be stuck here, forever!" The Shadow Knight laughed once again while leaning back in his chair.

"Don't get cocky". The Shadow Knight quickly turned around and jumped out of his seat. He looked in shock at the figure that stood in front of him.

"No...no...This...you...your not real" The Shadow Knight stuttered. The figures frown deepened.

Sadly for you, that statement is incorrect. I'm very real, and not amused in the slightest at what I've seen, this place, this world, and you.

This. Ends. Now."

 **Three Days Before the Beginning of the End**

At Tails and Sonic's house. Tails is hard at work on his latest project. He was making upgrades to the tornado, increasing different factors such as speed and fire power. Eggman had been very quiet lately. From past experiences, this was the hint they needed to get prepared, and fast. Surprisingly, Sonic was taking the matter just as seriously as Tails was. Tails completely approved of this, but he knew it just wasn't like Sonic to act like this. He was always easy going, even in times of danger. Tails was going to confront Sonic about it.

Tails was screwing in a bolt when he heard the door open. He left his tools down and went up to great the blue blur himself. Tails walked in the kitchen and saw Sonic eating a slice of bread.

"How was your run, Sonic?" Tails asked. Sonic looked up from his newspaper. "It was fine"

Sonic went back to reading his newspaper. Tails stood there for a few seconds awkwardly.

"so... do you want to go to forest for a picnic?" Tails asked, scratching his head.

Sonic looked at Tails with a 'did you really just ask me that' expression.

"Don't look at me like that, I like picnics, and you like laying out on the grass in the sun. Its a win win situation!" Tails said cheerily. Sonic sighed before getting up and getting a big bag. Tails smiled and helped him pack their food.

Tails had been waiting for a chance to do something fun with Sonic and get some real time to catch up. Tails was usually the more serious one, but because of Sonic's dull mood as of lately, Tails was forced to get them doing something fun. He knew Sonic didn't really enjoy picnics, but he couldn't do something like running or sport. He needed time to talk with Sonic.

"Nice view, isn't it?" Tails said breaking the silence since they got set up. Sonic stretched his legs while continuing to support his body on his two hands.

"It is nice. When did you find this place Tails?" Sonic asked

"While I was flying the tornado. I thought this would be a nice place to go. The cliff side view of the sea and the soft green grass, it just takes the edge off, you know."Tails smiled out at the sea. Sonic looked at Tails curiously for a few seconds. He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out. He instead looked out at the sea with Tails.

It was Tails who first broke his hypnotic gaze on the sea. "Listen Sonic, this is a wonderful place and I'm having a really nice time, but I need to talk to you about well, you. I know Eggman is probably up to something big and I like the new serious attitude to this sort of thing, but its..." Tails paused for a moment while Sonic looked at him, awaiting a response.

"not you..." Tails finished quietly. Sonic eyes widened. The two stood awkwardly for a few moments.

"I understand what you mean Tails, but this is what you all wanted from me. What you wanted, right Tails? Sonic said plainly.

"Well, yeah, but I, I..." Tails tried to continue, but couldn't argue against Sonic. Sonic was right. This is what he and his friends wanted. Now that they had a serious Sonic on the job, it felt off. Tails actually got a few small chills when he and Sonic locked eyes for more than a second or two. Sonic was actually quite scary when he was really serious, even more so than Shadow.

The silence was broken by a beeping sound coming from Tails communicator. Tails answered it, "was is it Amy?" Tails asked.

"Its Eggman! He's after me in some giant robot! GET SONIC!" Amy screeched into the communicator. Tails pulled his head away from his hand.

"Wait! Amy, where are you? Amy? Amy!? Damn it! Luckily I have a tracking device on her communicator from the last time she was captured." Tails said quickly tracking her on the communicator. "I got it! Lets go Son..." Tails stopped when he saw no one behind him. He had been talking to himself. Tails felt his spirit shrink as he realised that Sonic had went to save Amy without him.

"But, I thought... I thought we were a team" Tails said sadly. Tails stood there motionless as a light breeze brushed past him.

ot tahw tnsi tnod yrt nekorb xif ekatsim dengis sti gib a


	18. Chapter 18 The Roots of Isolation

**Chapter 21**

 **Four Days Before the Beginning of the End**

Sonic was doing a midnight run around the town, when he was stopped in his tracks by a girls scream. "That sounds like trouble", Sonic thought. He focused in on the sounds that lead him to an alley entrance. A mugger had a young hedgehog against a wall and was threatening her with a knife to her throat.

"HEY! Why don't you pick on someone your own size, wimp" Sonic growled. The mugger turned to find the one and only Sonic The Hedgehog, standing at the entrance to the alley. At first he thought he was really in for it, but then he realised he had the secret ace against good guys.

"I have a better idea, spiky. How about you run far away from here, or the girl ain't gona see tomorrow, 'hero'. The Bear laughed as he taunted the hedgehog while teasing the girl with his knife. "HELP ME, PLEASE! the girl screeched as she felt the cold knife pressing tightly against her throat.

Sonic gritted his teeth together, but then remembered what he had been told. Sonic's teeth went back behind his lips and a smile crept onto the side of his mouth.

"I dare you" Sonic said coldly. The bears laughter instantly stopped as he looked at Sonic in shock. "What!? Your...your bluffing! I know you wont let anything happen to the girl" the bear responded. Sonic chuckled.

"What I'm saying is, if anything happens to her, you'll have to deal with a very angry me." Sonic walked up to the bear until he was a few feat away. "Without a human shield, and well, the police will have a two death case on their hands" Sonic added more serous sounding than he had intended. The bear was really scared now. He knew Sonic didn't kill and Sonic was helpless when a life was on the line, or at least that was what the papers told. The look in his eyes however, convinced him otherwise. It was too risky.

"Okay okay, take her and leave me alone!" The bear said, throwing the girl at Sonic and making a dash for it. Sonic caught her and put her next to the wall. The whole situation had made her legs like jelly. After quickly making sure she was okay, Sonic ran after the bear and spotted him after about two seconds. He saw the bear climbing up a big ladder to get to the roof. Sonic ran up the other side of the wall and waited for the bear to get up the ladder.

"That was a close one back there, blue idiot nearly had me," he smiled a bit until he was meat with two blue legs at the top. He looked up to see Sonic with his arms folded. "Correction, has you" Sonic grabbed the bear and lifted him up above the edge.

"Whoa, for a scrawny guy, your really strong" the bear smiled before seeing Sonic's unfazed expression. Sonic took a lot of crime light heartily, even what others would consider horrible, but threatening murder was no joking matter, no matter how cheerful the hedgehog could be. This time however, Sonic was really not having any of this sick joke this bear was playing with him.

"Do me a favour, would ya" Sonic said. The bear nodded innocently, "of course. Anything for you mister Sonic.

"Stay in the hospital".

Sonic let go of the bear. He screamed as fell fast onto the hard concrete making a little splat noise. Sonic looked down at the figure laying motionless on the ground. A few moments passed until the bear started groaning in pain. Sonic sighed in relief, "that was too close. The blood on the ground really made my blood run cold." Sonic said to himself.

On the way back home, Sonic was in deep thought about what he had done. "I really went too far back there, but he did deserve it, didn't it? If I apply similar methods, but tone it down a notch or two, It could be a great help in the future. After all, he did tell me this sort of thing will happen and that I would need to be cruel about. I didn't think he meant this soon though, jeez. I need to be careful in the future though. I was really playing a dangerous game back there. Sonic's train of thought stopped as he reached his house.

Sonic opened the door and made his way to the kitchen to get a quick snack. Two hours had gone by when Sonic realised that Tails hadn't come out of his workshop all day. "he must be starving" Sonic thought to himself. He quickly got a few chilli dogs and made his way to Tails workshop.

Sonic knocked on the door a few times, but after getting no response he let himself in. Sonic saw Tails inside the cockpit with tons of tools scattered around the place. "Tails, I brought you something to eat" Sonic said smiling. He stood awkward for a while, getting no response from his little bro. "Okay, that's it. I know your working hard Tails, but ignoring me is not cool, Tails". The sound of screws continued to fill the room. Sonic jumped up on the cockpit and put his hand on Tails shoulder. Before Sonic could say anything, Tails jumped up at the touch of Sonic's hand, pushing Sonic off the plane in the process.

"Eggman!" Tails said in panic, trying to compose himself. He was in so much panic that his ear muffs fell off.

"Its _me,_ Tails", Sonic said from the floor of oil he had tried to avoid on the way in. Tails chuckled while scratching the back of his head. "Whoops, sorry Sonic. I guess I got a little isolated down here. Sonic jumped up and gave Tails a thumbs up.

"Don't worry about it buddy, I was going to take a shower soon anyway, but I think I'll move it to now, hehe." Sonic said chuckling a little. Tails however was not in the least bit happy after finding out he had messed up a lot of precise machinery work when Sonic came in.

"Get out..." Tails said as calmly as he could muster. Sonic smile faded as he heard the sound of Tails voice. It was cold.

"Sure, right after I see you getting some food into your system." Sonic said, trying to ignore the previous tone in Tails voice. Tails fists clenched together and his teeth jammed together.

"WOULD YOU JUST GO AWAY, YOU DUMB MORON!" Tails shouted turning around. He had just about of Sonic's stupidity interfering with his work. This time he had really angered Tails. If you had done that any other time during the day, he would have done little to no damage, because he had been doing light, easily fixable work. However, for the last hour he was doing work that required the utmost of concentration as well as a steady hand. All of it had been ruined in the blink of an eye. He. Was. Furious!

"I... eh, I'm really sorry Tails. I'll help you fix it!" Sonic said trying to lift the fox's spirit. Unfortunately, it had the opposite effect.

"Help? You'll help! Tails shouted furiously advanced threateningly. Sonic put his hands up in defence. Tails grabbed his tool box and flung it across the room, causing all the tools to crash all over the floor, making a load bang. Sonic looked at Tails cautiously.

"I know your mad, bu-"

"GET OUT!" Tails screamed at the top of his lungs.

Sonic knew he had really done it now. Feeling defeated, he did as he was told and left the room without so much as a glance at the fuming fox. Tails growled and picked up his tools on the floor and started over again.

An hour had passed and Tails wasn't doing too great. He didn't know what the problem was, he only knew the affect it was having on his work. He had been sloppy and slow, which made no sense to Tails. He was only ever sloppy when we went fast, but he was going slow to make sure he wouldn't have to redo anything for the third time, thanks to Sonic's 'great help'.

Tails gasped quietly. It was Sonic that was on his mind. The way he had treated his best friend was what had gnawing at his mind and causing his lack of focus. He had to apologise. Tails dropped his tools and ran out of the workshop and into the house.

"Sonic! Hey Sonic are you here!?" Tails shouted from the hallway. Tails proceeded to checking all the rooms. After finding no sign of his friend, he could only assume that Sonic had went for a run. Tails sighed and went into the sitting room and took a seat. He would have to wait for Sonic to come back from his run.

Tails thoughts were interrupted by a growl from his stomach. "I'm starved..." Tails said out loud.

In a forest, Sonic was whizzing past the trees, skillfully swerving around all the trees at an intense speed. Although his was depressed after Tails had basically kicked him out, he couldn't help from feeling happy, and his face showed it. If there was one thing Sonic could do to cheer himself up, it was to run. Rarely a destination, but that was the beauty of it for Sonic. No constrictions, no limits, no boundaries, only freedom. Sonic's smirk grew as he increased his speed further, tearing up the ground a little as he did so. "I guess he was kinda right about me. I do lose my sense of reality when I'm running, but I can't help it." Sonic's legs sped up again becoming just a blur of blue as he finally broke the sound barrier. "I just love the freedom!" Sonic shouted as he stopped dodging the trees and ripped straight through all them as he created a clean line through the forest, shouting all the way.

eht ? modeerf dengis ylno yaw si


	19. Chapter 19 The Cold Truth

**Chapter 22 The** **Cold Truth**

Sonic awoke with a loud yawn, stretching his arms out. He then quickly hoped out of bed and jumped out the window, landing firmly on the ground before bursting into a full sprint towards the forest. "I'll be back before your even awake" Sonic said to himself as he continue at a steady pace.

Sonic had been doing this same routine ever morning for the last month or so. Originally he would have waited for Tails so they could run together, but Tails had been losing interest in the morning runs. Sonic would never say it out loud, but Tails moaning in the morning was really annoying Sonic. His Comments such as "Sonic, could you slow down?" and variants of "Sonic my 'Tails' are killing me, can we go back now." Sonic knew that others got tired a lot quicker then he did, but what he considered barely a warm up, Tails considered to going around the planet. Luckily for Sonic, Tails had said he was working on a big project and had to cut their morning exercise from his routine, which Sonic was completely fine with. He was one more "it took shorter to build the pyramids then this run" comment away from booting Tails from his morning runs.

Sonic always tried to get back before Tails woke up, which was harder then it sounded. Like Sonic, Tails too liked to get up at the crack of down for tinkering with his machines. It was a weird kind of challenge to do, but it was difficult and that's what mattered to Sonic.

Sonic was doing his normal route, when a small voice whispered in his head. " _turn left at the lake"._ Sonic heart raced for a second, but for some reason, he was compelled to listen. Sonic followed the voice that led him way off his usual course and into a cave. He kept walking until he saw a tent with two torches on both sides. Sonic finally snapped out of his daze and stopped.

"I don't know who you are in there, but come out and show yourself!" Sonic said getting into a fighting stance. _"_ I know your not going to budge, so I guess I'll have to come out to you _"_ the voice said. Sonic watched as a cloaked figure exited the tent slowly. The cloak covered his entire body, leaving only a tiny opening for his face. It was still quite dark so Sonic couldn't see his face.

"Who are you, and how did you speak inside my head!" Sonic demanded

"I don't have much time to talk, so lets get some things out of the way. I'm not an enemy and I have the ability to speak to people far away, okay" the cloaked figure said.

Sonic looked at him suspiciously for a few seconds before finally dropping his fists. "Alright, but this better be important, I have a run to finish you know."

Yes, of course, but this is very important, so listen closely. I have known you for a long time, without you even realising I was there. I have lived for a very long time, but I have never encountered anyone like you in the worlds I've been to." Sonic looked at the cloaked figure strangely. "What do you mean...worlds". Sonic said.

"That's not important right now. What is important, is you" He finished with a dramatic pause.

"Oh yeah, what about me?" Sonic was already getting bored of this 'speech' he was getting. He wanted him to get straight to the point.

"Fine, I'll get straight to it then. Start treating your fights with evil seriously," the cloaked figure said. Sonic snapped out of his daze and looked at him with a smirk.

"I don't treat bad guys kindly. I wop their butt and send them hiking, what more do you want creepy cloaked guy", Sonic snickered and rubbed his nose. The cloaked person said nothing for a couple of seconds, but then he took off his cloak and throw it to the ground. Standing in front of Sonic was a replica of himself, made of little energy particles.

"WHAT THE HECK!" Sonic shouted jumping back away from the mirrored version of himself. "What are you", Sonic said curiously. Suddenly the energy body broke apart into smaller particles of energy that faded into the air. Sonic was about to walk away when he heard the same voice inside his head speak to him again.

 _That weird version of you was me. It took a lot of energy to do it and I hope I won't have to do it again, but I needed it to prove a point._

"And what's that", Sonic said out loud.

" _That it isn't someone else arguing with you, it's yourself."_

"Nope, I'm quite sure your arguing with me. After all, you did say that creeping version of me was just you." There was a pause before the voice spoke again.

 _"The only reason I'm in your head is because your allowing it. I made the copy to visually show you that everything I said was what a part of you was already thinking. Seeing is believing after all, and I wasn't lying when I said I knew you for a long time, in fact let me prove it and tell you something very important at the same time, ready."_ the voice asked

"If it'll make you go away, yeah sure" Sonic said in an annoyed voice.

He's snide comment was ignored and the voice continued. _"Your inability to take things seriously has time and time again put you and your friends in danger. The best example I can think of is when you were captured by Eggman and turned into the werehog, remember that_

 _"_ He got lucky, that's all. Besides, I kicked his butt in the end, like always. _"_ Sonic said smugly.

 _"NO! YOU got lucky. If he had left the machine on longer, it would have killed you. Even right now, while I'm telling you that your life should have ended, your still ignoring me and to add insult to injury you have that stupid smug grin on your face. I guess I'll have to show you the hard way..."_ the voice said fading away.

Sonic rolled his eyes and exited the cave, "now that the creepy voice is gone, I can go home. Tails should be long up by now, maybe he's doing something cool." Sonic burst into a sprint back to his house.

As he was in the woods, he heard a familiar voice call out in help, "Sonic! Help me". Sonic stopped in his tracks,"Tails, Tails were are you buddy!" Sonic ran in the general direction of the sound. After running for a few minutes, he couldn't find Tails. It was impossible to Sonic, the faster he ran to the sound, the further away it was. It was driving him insane because the once calls for help become screams of pain. Sonic was in pain just hearing them. After running for another minute, the screams just stopped, and was replaced by another voice, _"How does it feel?"_

"You again! Did you make me hear the suffering of my best friend!?" Sonic yelled out angrily.

 _"How did it feel to know that no matter how hard you try, you couldn't get to him, not so good I'm guessing"_

"SHUT UP! I've had enough of you! Before you were just annoying, now your making me hear sounds of my brother getting hurt. This sick game your playing has gone on long enough, Now get out of my head!"

Sonic breathed heavily as he let his anger show.

 _"Fine. I'll leave. But I'll still give you a chance at saving yourself. Soon enough you'll have to make decisions that the you before today would not have made. Some of these will be a choice only you can make, but if you refuse to listen to me and continue to not take the world seriously... Your friends are going to die..."_

"Wait, what! What do you mean my friends are gona die!?" Sonic shouted in panic. As the voice promised, it did not say another word and was gone.

"TELL ME!" Sonic shouted in desperation. He had been scared to death by the last six words he was told, but he had no idea why. It was just words from a creepy voice in his head, yet it felt like by just being told his friends were gona die, it made him feel like the were dying in front of him.

Sonic took a couple of deep breaths to slow down his heart rate. He could almost feel it pounding against his chest. After sitting down against a tree for a few minutes, he had calmed himself down. The thought of his friends dying was still fresh in his mind though. Sonic than realised that maybe the voice he had heard before was somehow connected to what he really thought. After all, why would he freak out so much about something a creepy voice said, it didn't make it true. It was like a different part of himself was projecting itself as a voice to get the message to his stubborn mind.

The only thing Sonic knew for certain right now, his care free morning run, had been ruined.

rof wodahS retaw dengis ytliug seil eht era


	20. Chapter 20 A Light in the Darkness

**Chapter 23 A Light in the Darkness**

 **The plane ride to the end of the blue blur**

In Tails workshop, Tails is making some last minute checks on the X Tornado. Sonic is silently waiting in the corner for him to finish.

"Whew, alright Sonic, were ready to go! Hop in. Tails said as he jumped into the cockpit. Instead of jumping in the seat, Sonic jumped on the wing and stuck his shoes firmly on the surface.

"Eh... Sonic? I didn't make a passenger seat for the fun of it, why are you on the wing?"

"I just eh... need the fresh air to think, that's all." Sonic said casually. Tails looked oddly at Sonic for a moment before shrugging his shoulders and starting the engine.

Some time later...

 **Sonic's POV**

Finally, Angel island is in view. I felt my head getting a bit wet so I looked up and saw a big rain cloud above my head. I grunted as the icy rain water stuck to the fur and only got worse. I hate rain... I have to focus, regardless of this poisonous substance dripping off my body. Something's wrong. I don't feel it, the thrill. Where is it? I'm about to give Eggman the boot, my second favourite thing, after running of course. Is it the rain? No, it isn't. Is this what it feels like to be Shadow? Oh god it's horrible! No, it's none of those things, it's... it's... that voice, I don't hear it, but I feel it in my bones, my quills, my mind... Everything in my body is trying to give a message. The message, I see it, I feel it. I have one shot, one shot, one shot...

I snapped out of my dassed state and heard Tails speak to me.

"Are you sure you don't wan't to come in Sonic, it's getting seriously windy out there" Tails said to me.

There was a chill in the air. I just hope I didn't cause it...

 **Back To Present Time...**

The Shadow Knight stared at the figure in front of him in shock. He then squinted his eyes and noticed the body in front of him shift and change itself ever so slightly. He breathed out a sigh of relief, "jeez, I got to admit, you had me spooked for a moment there. Oh, how rude of me, you were saying something about this ending now, something along those lines," the Shadow Knight said smugly.

"It's fine. I don't need to say anything more. Seeing your scared face was worth the energy it took to look like exactly like Sonic." The energy version of Sonic smirked as smugly as he could.

The Shadow Knight growled angrily, "CUT THAT OUT! He shouted as he dashed through the air and punched a hole through Sonic. The energy started shaking before slowly dissolving into the air The energy spoke in quiet words as it vanished, "it may not end today as I said it would, but you will answer to justice... you will..." At that, the energy completely went and the voice was silenced

The Shadow Knight stared angrily at the ground for a few moments before taking in a deep breath, regaining his composure. "I don't care what that ridiculous blob of energy says, nothing will stop me. Oh no, Sonic will try and stop me. Oh wait, I forgot, he's dead!" The Shadow Knight burst into a fit of laughter and even fell on the floor rolling around.

 **...**

"Ughhhhh, wha... where... What's happening, I... I thought I was dead... Where am I?". The figure opened and closed his eyes a few times, seeing the same on both sides, nothing. Until he looked down and saw the familiar sight of his body. He looked around his body seeing everything in perfect condition. No blood from his red and white shoes to his spiky head. There was nothing but black in every direction, even below him. He was standing on literally nothing.

He put his hands over his face and tried to understand what the fuck was happening. Until he heard a familiar voice call his name

"Sonic". Sonic's ears shot up at the sound of his name. "Who's there " he said unsure if the voice was even real.

"You know this voice Sonic. Now listen to me, just this once" the voice said, almost sounding like a beg. Sonic was quiet for a long time.

"Okay" he said with no emotion in his voice.

"I am the spirit of the Chaos emeralds. I know I said I was a part of you, and that still is true. You have been in so much contact with the chaos emeralds that I have become a part of you. Also, the many rings you have collected over the years have increased my power inside of you. You still have complete control over me, but now your dead..."

Sonic shuddered at the sound of that. He's mind was broken, he felt dead inside and now he knew why.

"I know this sounds horrible, being told your dead and all. But you wouldn't be talking to me if you were dead, would you.

At this, Sonic's eyes sparked to life and regained their emerald green colour.

"Yes Sonic, there it is, that spark! It is only because of the influence of the huge energy resting in your body and your amazing will to live, that any of this is possible. If this was a game Sonic. We broke it. Sonic uncurled himself from his ball, "what are you saying!?" Sonic's brain still couldn't comprehend any of this.

"What I'm saying is... you ain't dead just yet. If, or course, you can get your lazy bones off the ground and prove why you should still be alive! Everything you've done, all your adventures... your friends."

At the word 'friends' Sonic blank mind lit up with all his memories. The fight against dark oak, cosmo's sacrifice, the time eater, dark gaia, Eggman and every adventure he had been through, with all his friends. It all flashed through his mind until it slowed down to the day he first met Tails.

Sonic eyes burned like fire and he jumped off the ground, standing with his fists clenched. A glare that would burn you to a crisp.

"Yes... This is it... the fire in your eyes, the sheer force of your clenched fists, the strength of you legs that a earthquake wouldn't shake. I have existed for millions of years, travelling over different words, watching fools abuse my power for evil, over and over again. But not you. A selfless hero who cares about nothing more than helping others and being as free as the wind. I have finally found someone to be one with. This is it. Are you ready?

Sonic stared off into the darkness like it was all his fears combined into one endless line of darkness.

"Lets do this"! Sonic shouted, punching his fist into the darkness above him.

 **In the real world**

All the chaos emeralds flashed and a white energy shot out of them and flew to the remains of Sonic, disappearing into it.

 **Back to Sonic**

A white light out of nowhere, forcing Sonic to cover his eyes. The light finally dimmed, revealing a crystal white hedgehog, looking identical to Sonic in every aspect but colour. They looked a each for a few seconds until the white one spoke. "When we do this, we wont just be in one body, we will be completely fused together. The best way to think of it is when we combine, we will be the baby to us, if that makes sense. The big difference being we won't pass over some traits, we'll pass all our traits. I know your ready, so lets do it". Sonic nodded his head and smirked. The white hedgehog and Sonic jumped into each other, their body slowly morphing together. The memory's of both started combining, their knowledge of fighting followed and finally their body's completely merged together, creating a massive blast of energy around them.

As the wave of energy cleared and the light dimmed, one hedgehog hovered above the ground. The hedgehog slowly lowered his feet to the ground. As his feet his the ground, a small ring of white energy flew out from his feet and across the dark surface.

He stood motionless with his eyes closed for a while, until his eyes shot open.

His silver, glowing eyes.

"Now it ends"

tsethgirb eht a dengis ssenkrad ni ? thgil senihs


	21. Chapter 21 Light vs Dark part 1

**Chapter 24 Light vs Dark part 1**

The hedgehog stood silently in the darkness, waiting for something to happen. Out of the ground a few metres in front of him, the darkness rose from the ground and formed a mirror version of the other.

"That was some show you put on. But, your glowing body aside, I think it's time for you to leave this place and die like a normal creature. I don't know how you were able to prolong your life by staying here and also having enough power to transform into whatever you are now." the darkness said with curiosity.

The other hedgehog was silent for a moment before responding, "I'm not a normal creature. I am..." he thought for a few seconds, trying to think of a name for himself, when he got a quick memory of the chaos energy telling the future fusion of himself and Sonic that he should keep the name Sonic. "I am Sonic" he said.

"I know who you are idiot, every stubborn soul that has somehow prolonged their life by getting in here, has a version of myself that knows everything about them. I don't mean to tell you what to do, but isn't your iconic way of saying that something like 'Sonic, Sonic The Hedgehog' or has that gotten old?"

Sonic was growing bored of this quickly. He was wondering how a dark deathly version of himself could be this annoying. "Can we just skip the pointless trash talk and fight, I have more important things to do than to play with idiots." The darkness starting laughed loudly while holding his stomach. When he finally stopped, he looked at Sonic with a smug expression. "Don't be absurd, this is how things will play out, we fight, you realise it's pointless, you die again and that's the end of you, any questions shiny hedgehog" He said wiping a tear from his eye, still slightly laughing. When he looked back however, Sonic was nowhere to be seen.

"Wait, what!" he said looking around sharply. "You can't sneak up on me, I can see everything!" He said checking around him. He could see everything here, because he was everything. How could he hide? He quickly lost his patience, "where is that-" he was interrupted be an elbow being shoved into his gut.

"That genius. Right here, that help?" Sonic said with his elbow still shoved in his gut. "I...I...how" the dark hedgehog stuttered in more confusion than pain. Sonic's smile faded. He grabbed him by the throat and kicked him away. The dark hedgehog grunted, before pretending to dust himself off.

"Cheap shots, that's all. If you were trying to punch the non existing air out of me, good job." He taunted.

Sonic smiled in response, looking at his own arms and legs, examining them.

"ENOUGH OF THIS, you should be scared, not smiling. Don't worry though, the great Dark will destroy you!" Dark said creating a little blast of darkness around him.

"Jeez, calm it would ya, the place was already dark, but great name though. How long did you take thinking it up, half a second. Maybe I should call myself light, to prove I'm happy being a one dimensional character, heh heh." Sonic closed his eyes and rubbed his nose. Dark dissolved and reappeared behind him, hoping to take him by surprise. As soon as he reappeared, he was met with a quick elbow to the gut again, followed by a powerful back kick to the chest. Dark went flying across the floor, tumbling on the ground before stopping.

"What the...?" Dark said shocked.

"And you accuse 'me' of cheap shots, funny". Sonic looked at Dark directly in the eyes, smirking. Dark growled, his eyes twitching uncontrollably. Dark ran towards Sonic at high speed, leaving a trail of dark energy behind him. Sonic did the same and dashed into Dark, locking fists with him. They both tried pushing the others fists back and gain the upper hand. After a few seconds of Dark slowly pushing Sonic back, in one quick movement, Sonic pushed his fists through Dark's and punched him in the jaw and doing a jumping spinning kick to the other side of his face, causing Dark to spin away. Sonic ran around Dark while he was disoriented and yanked his legs off the ground.

"HEY!" Dark said as Sonic began spinning him around in circles. "S-Stop it, your not fighting how you should be, where's the homing attack!" Dark said, starting to get really dizzy. Sonic increased the speed. "My apologies, I should be predictable so you can have a chance. I'm not an idiot." Sonic increased the speed a lot this time, both of them starting to become a blur.

"ENOUGH!" Dark charged up an energy blast in his hand and aimed it at Sonic heads. Just as he was about to fire, Sonic let go of Dark.

AHHHHHHHHHH! Dark shouted as he flew through the air, going out of eyesight from Sonic. Sonic smiled slightly, "He'll be back".

Sure enough, a very pissed off Dark formed from the dark in front of Sonic. "Back so soon" Sonic said, pretending to be surprised. Dark stopped growling and smiled. "Don't get so confident, you may have won this battle, but you haven't won the war, and it will be a tough one" Dark said. Sonic gave a bored frown.

"Make that face all you want, if your bored then I promise you won't be in a second. Mainly cause we are in the practise room."

"Practise room?" Sonic said, tuning in.

"Ah, your listening now aren't ya. Yes, this is the practise room, but I think were done here. In each of these next rooms you will face a new challenge, think your up for the challenge, shiny boy!"

"Sure" Sonic said calmly while stretching his legs and arms. Suddenly the room transformed into Sonic and Tails house. Sonic walked around the room and checked out all the pictures on the walls. The was one picture of each of his friends hanging on the walls in a frame of their associated colour.

"I don't think I have a picture of everyone in my living room, get your facts straight" Sonic said folding his arms. Dark grinned, "this is the friendship room, all your friends are on the walls! Isn't that cool! Dark said kindly. Sonic gave him a cold stare.

"Alright, I get it, you want to get on to the fighting, fair enough." Dark transformed his shape and colour to match Knuckles.

"Don't touch my Master emerald!" Dark said with Knuckles voice.

"I have no problem beating up Knuckles" Sonic explained. Dark changed into Amy, "how about now, soniku." Amy said giggling. Sonic stared at her in confusion. "Soniku... oh right, Soniku, funny. Still not seeing the point of this though." Sonic said cracking his knuckles.

Dark smiled, "You wont lay a finger on Amy, i know everything about you." Sonic closed his eyes, "No, you don't". In the blink of an eye, Sonic dashed into dark and rammed his fist into her stomach. Amy gasped in pain and fell to the ground crying. "H-How could you Sonic, I-I-I cant breathe, it's me Sonic. He transported me here, m-my stomach." Amy held her stomach in pain.

Sonic helped her up, "I'm so so sorry Amy." Sonic put his hand on his chin, "OH, I have an idea!" He grabbed Amy and smashed her head into the wall.

"Feel better sweetie" Sonic said with a grin.

"Screw you" Amy mumbled from inside the wall. She broke her head out and charged at Sonic. Sonic dodged multiple hammer attacks before jumping through the sealing to avoid a mini earthquake attack. Amy jumped through the hole after him. Sonic was nowhere to be seen.

"Don't be a fool, you cant hide for long". Amy looked around upstairs, pretending not to know where he was. Once she had walked past the closet she thought he was in, she quickly spun around smashing the locker to pieces with her hammer. Sonic spin dashed through the bed and snatched her hammer. Before she had any time to react, she was smashed across the room by her own mallet. He dropped the mallet on her and jumped back through the hole. Amy pushed the hammer off her face.

Amy sighed, "I really hate that hedgehog".

Sonic was waiting for Amy to come downstairs. Amy appeared moments later. "Enough of this, it's clear that you have no remorse for hurting your beloved Amy, so transforming into your other friends will do no good, except one. Dark transformed into Shadow.

"Heh heh, ready to dance, faker!"

Sonic got into a fighting stance and waited for Shadow to make the first move. Shadow charged towards Sonic and homing attacked him. Sonic blocked it with his two arms. Shadow, already being in the air from the homing attack, through multiple chaos spears, "chaos spears!" Dark shouted. Sonic didn't move and soon disappeared in the explosion. Due to the explosion, the entire house started to crumble.

Shadow had already jumped out of the house and was smiling as he saw it sink into the ground.

"I wonder how bad he'll look when he comes out, or better yet, he doesn't come out at all!" Shadow laughed loudly. Shadow continued looking at the house, his smile getting bigger. "Guess I'll have to drag him out if I want to see it".

While Shadow was gloating, a figure appeared behind. Sonic then grabbed his arms and held them in a lock.

"What the-" Shadow stuttered as he felt someone grab him from behind. "HEY! Let go of me!" Shadow shouted in annoyance. He tried shaking him off, but Sonic had his shoulders held back tight. He growled in frustration until he had enough and disappeared into smoke and appeared a few feet in front of Sonic, in his normal form.

"Got bored of being Shadow?" Sonic said. Dark cracked his neck, "quit your taunting, were going on to the next room. To be honest, I didn't think you'd clear that room so easily, but we'll see how you handle the next room!"

Sonic stretched some more. Although he didn't look like much of a taunt, it was driving Dark crazy, but he tried his best to ignore it. This time the room changed into a forest with burning trees and smoke everywhere. Dark disappeared and Sonic was left alone. He heard screams coming from far away in the forest. He knew this was some sort of mind game, but he also felt the need to follow the sound. Sonic ran through the burnt forest dodging falling trees and breaking through ones in the way.

He stopped in his tracks when the sound stopped and a house appeared in front of him. He entered the house and saw two hedgehogs lying under a burning plank. Sonic knew they were dead, this wasn't meant to be happy ending, it was meant to mess with his head. He lifted the plank off and looked at their faces. He knew who's parents they were, he saw they intent behind this room, but he didn't feel any need to mourn over them, especially since they weren't real.

He gently put them on the ground and walked out of the house and saw Eggman standing there with a chaos emerald. "Be seeing ya around kid" he said with an evil grin as he turned to leave. Dark watched from above, waiting for Sonic to snap. To his complete surprise, Sonic leaned against the house wall and closed his eyes.

"How can this be, this was the most traumatic experience of his life, a-and he just let Eggman walk away, with his parents blood on his hands!." This just doesn't add up. He's completely changed". Dark thought to himself.

Dark appeared from the smoke and threw a stone at him. Sonic jerked his head to the left to avoid it. He got up from the wall and opened his eyes.

"Time out for a second. How did your personality and fighting style change in such a short time?" Dark asked curiously.

Sonic thought about it for awhile. "Felt like changing it", Sonic said. Dark growled, "enough of your lies, I know everything about you, I'm your death escort, so It's impossible for me not to know".

"I don't think 'impossible' is the word your looking for." Sonic responded.

"Actually, impossible is the right word, not that your immature brain could understand. But this shouldn't be happening. It feels like I'm with the wrong dead guy", Dark said.

"Your just annoyed because your losing" Sonic said smiling.

"ENOUGH! I've had just about enough of your mockery. I don't care what you are, or how you're able to teleport. This last room will surely be the end for you!" Dark shouted as he flicked his fingers, causing the room to change again. This time taking much longer than the others.

The whole room was submerged into water. There were at the bottom of the sea with never ending water in every direction except beneath him. "If you haven't guessed it by now, this is your fear room. Quite unfortunate your fear is water, your going to drown before I can kill you myself, what a shame" Dark laughed and took in loads of water, which had no effect on him.

This time Sonic was actually nervous. He held in his breath and looked for a source of oxygen, but found none. Dark looked at Sonic's face and finally got what he wanted, fear on Sonic's face. Sonic stopped struggling in the water and tried to think clearly in the few seconds he had to spare. He closed his eyes and energy emitted from his body. Dark watched in horror as Sonic's body was encased in an energy bubble, with no water inside.

"IMPOSSIBLE" Dark shouted and sprayed tons of dark blasts at Sonic. Although Sonic had made a genius move that saved his life, he was still very slow and just narrowly jumped out of the way of the blasts. Dark put his hands forward and started charging for a huge blast, in the hope of taking Sonic out in one go.

Sonic saw Dark charging up and smiled. It wasn't the best idea to attack that attack head on, but with the water slowing him down, he was sure to get hit. But Sonic knew that even if he could dodge it, he just couldn't resist the challenge being presented in front of him. He copied Dark and began charging his own energy into one big blast. As they both were ready to unleash their blasts, Sonic then realised there was only one way to go.

Straight through Dark.

eht niaga ohw t'nac dengis dias daed namggE klaw


	22. Chapter 22 Light vs Dark part 2

**Chapter 25 Light vs Dark part 2**

Sonic and Dark looked each other straight in the eye, daring the other to fire first. Dark shot his blast first, itching to see Sonic get destroyed for good. Sonic then shot his at Dark's, as both of their beams getting closer to each other, Sonic's smirk widened.

"THIS TIME, YOU'LL DIE FOR GOOD!" Dark shouted as the beams connected, energy shooting everywhere. Pity no one was there to witness it, it was a sight to behold. The light and dark beams struggled against each other, creating a moon of equal light and dark. Dark increased the power, pushing the light back. Sonic put one of his hands down and increase the intensity with his other hand, blasting another wave back at Dark. Dark growled as the stalemate was resumed. They both started gradually increasing the pressure, so much that they lost sight of each other. The pressure was started to become dangerously high and the ball of energy they had created in the middle of them was beginning to look like an energy bomb waiting to go off. Unknown to Dark, Sonic was charging more energy in his left hand, while he was only using his right hand in the main fight.

"ENOUGH! DIE! Dark shouted as he shot a crazy amount of energy from his hands, pushing the huge ball of energy closer to Sonic. Dark laughed as he saw Sonic's attempts to push back fail. "I told you from the beginning Sonic, you had no chance. Now then, any last words?" Dark said. The ball had gotten so close that Sonic's vision consisted of only the colour white.

"Last words huh, eh... what was that word again... it's in my memory somewhere... something like kaamen, no... kanalahe... oh screw the name!" Sonic snapped out of his thoughts and fired all the energy he had gathered from his left hand straight in front of him, rapidly pushing the energy ball back at Dark. Dark had no idea what was coming his way, as he was laughing with his eyes closed, waiting for the glorious sound of a huge bang.

"Well, this has been fun, bu- wait" Dark opened his eyes and saw a huge ball of energy closing in on him fast.

"WHAT!?" Dark shouted as the light energy ripped through the dark. Dark put his hands forward in desperation, trying to stop it. It was no use though, and Dark was caught in the ball.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO"! He screamed in agony as his body was being ripped apart. Sonic then watched as the ball exploded, covering the entire room in light. The light then faded, the room again becoming black once more. The body of Dark however, did not return. Sonic was not convinced just yet and quickly scanned his eyes around. Satisfied, Sonic smirked and walked around the empty room. "Now that he's gone, I'm sure the exit will open itself to me. If it doesn't, I suppose I could just blast my way out of here." Sonic said out loud as he walked around in search for an exit to appear. Sonic searched for a long time, but found nothing but darkness.

"Where is it?" Sonic said in frustration. Suddenly he felt a weird energy behind him. Sonic turned around a saw the darkness behind him get thicker. The darkness formed a huge familiar head.

"Dark..." Sonic said in annoyance. "I hoped I wouldn't have to beat you like this, but I told you, you couldn't win. AND I ALWAYS STAY TRUE TO MY WORD!" Dark shouted as the entire room started to close in on Sonic.

"WHAT!?" Sonic looked all around him, seeing the place cave in on him. He was still in his bubble, but he couldn't hold it for much longer, he had to get out of there. Sonic snapped to life and shot into the darkness above, trying to use his spin dash to rip through. Just as the darkness was below him, he broke through and ripped though more layers. He relaxed and the bubble around him disappeared. Luckily he was ripping through the layers faster then the darkness was catching him. He continued going for the next minute, his body still staying strong. His mind was not though. He was still gradually going faster then the darkness behind him, but he could still hear Dark's sickening laughter echo through the air. Dark's laughter meant one thing to Sonic, he wasn't going anywhere.

Sonic body and mind halted as he held his head in pain. The place had broken down in terms of physics, so luckily for Sonic, he was able to float in the air. A dark mist then shot out of Sonic a began forming a body. Sonic breathed heavily and looked at the figure in front of him.

"We don't have much time, so hurry up and go now!" the mystery hedgehog said.

"...Dark Sonic? Wait... what is going on here, what are you doing" Sonic said in confusion. Dark Sonic turned around and met Sonic eyes. He smiled before speaking, "I knew you two would get together and hit it off. Talk about playing hard to get though, I told him Sonic was the one, but he was all cautious and stuff". Sonic stared blankly at him. The sound of evil laughter was getting closer by the second. Dark Sonic knew he had to wrap this up.

"Listen Sonic, I know this is all so much right now and I hoped that I could be here to witness this beautiful new being blossom and grow. We had fun though and that's what matters, right?".

Not really sure how to react, Sonic just nodded. Dark Sonic continued, "Good. Goodbye, Sonic the hedgehog..." Dark Sonic flew down just as the darkness reached them. He charged into Dark and acted like a magnet, forcing all of dark to get pulled down with him.

"YOU INSECT, GET OFF OF ME!" Dark shouted as he was pulled down. Sonic wasted no time on dramatic, pointless attempts to mourn Dark Sonic, he had to go now! Sonic felt pain in his heart, like he lost a whole part of his body and mind. He pushed through these emotions and got back into a spin dash and went up as fast as he could.

He could fell a darkness rising below him again, this time at massive speed. Sonic looked back down and saw a furious looking Dark rising faster then he was moving. Sonic screamed as he went full power and he began burning through the dark like it was paper. He could finally feel it, the light.

"THIS CANT BE HAPPENING. ITS IMPOSSIBLE! Dark shouted as everything started collapsing. All the darkness started collapsing on Sonic, but he continued to rip through it. Nothing could stop Sonic now, he was too close to freedom. He could see bits of light getting closer with every layer of dark he cut. He growled in pain as he felt his whole body burn from the intensity of the amount of energy he was putting into his spin.

Sonic then felt it. The light at the end. He had done it. As he reached the light, the light blocked off the dark behind him.

The last thing Sonic heard was the wild banging and screams of Dark, before he passed out...

thgil krad esoprup sevig, slortnoc krad thgil ? dengis


	23. Chapter 23 The Walking Dead

**Chapter 26 The Walking Dead**

Hours passed when Sonic finally became conscious again. He wasn't in the same place though. As he looked around his new environment, he couldn't complain, it was beautiful. He was lying on bright green grass beside a waterfall. He very much enjoyed the sound and sight of the water crashing down. It made him feel very relaxed.

Sonic sighed and got up. It was great, but he knew it was too good to be true. He wasn't out of the woods just yet. Instead of running around though, he decided to stay put. Sonic put his legs into the water and laid back against the side. The water was shallow at the sides so it was perfect. He figured that if he waited long enough, someone would come to find him.

Fifteen minutes passed until Sonic heard a voice, "Enjoying yourself?" said a soft feminine voice.

"No" Sonic replied.

"Jeez, I thought you were the cheerful one. Enjoying the water at least? the girl asked from the other side of the river.

"Yes. Your condescending voice, not so much. How about you stop this stupid casual conversation and get to the point." Sonic said in annoyance.

"Okay, Okay, I get it, you want to go back to the living world, right?" said the girl, already knowing the answer.

"Obviously, so show me the way out." Sonic said, jumping out of the water. She looked at the ground for a while, thinking about helping him or not. She sighed and pointed at the waterfall, "jump through the waterfall to get back to the living world" she said.

Sonic nodded and was about to jump through, but stopped himself. This was too good to be true.

"Soooo... where's the actual exit" Sonic said frowning.

"I know you'd find it sooner or later, and since you've clearly had it bad enough already, I figured there was no need to prolong your return to the living world. So just go" she said. Sonic turned to leave.

"This isn't right, you shouldn't have done this". she said.

"And you shouldn't have watched me just leave, should you." Sonic replied. She opened her mouth to respond, but didn't have a come back to that.

"Goodbye" Sonic said before jumping into the portal. The first thing he felt was his eyes snap shut from the burning light. He felt tingly all over and hoped that meant his return. As he felt the light dim, he assumed it was fine to open his eyes. He could barely believe it. His body, his muscles, his organs, it all felt real again. He looked around and was confused. He had assumed he would be in the same place he was when he died, but he was on what looked to be the street Cream lived on.

Sonic tried to get up, but after standing for a second, he fell down on his knee. He looked at his hands and saw blood on them. He was so wrapped up in finding out that he was alive that he didn't notice the blood that was running down his entire body and head like rain drops.

"Vanilla can help... I don't want help, but I have no choice." sonic clenched his bloody fists and attempted to get up again. This time he stood a bit stronger and began to slowly limp his way towards Vanilla's house. Sonic was angry that he was forced to get assistance, but he was not taking the chance of dying again after all he went through to come back from death. A drop of blood rolled down his forehead and dripped over his eye. He rubbed the blood off his eye and continued on.

After a few minutes of limping, he was getting tired. It wasn't far away, but in his state, it felt like walking a desert. His vision had even become a little blurry. It then began raining. The cool touch of the water running off him felt nice on his burning hot skin.

He turned a corner and saw the house. "Almost there" he thought to himself. He was just about able to make it to the door and ring the doorbell. He actually felt a lot better since the raining had started, but he was still heavily injured.

The door opened, "Hello, what ca- OH GOD" shouted Vanilla in shock. Sonic leaned against the wall.

"Ple-please co-come in" Vanilla motioned for him to come in, but realised he was in even worse condition then he looked, if that was possible. She wrapped her arm around Sonic's back and slowly helped him over to the sofa. She laid him down and went to get cloths.

Cream heard the commotion and went downstairs to see what was happening. She saw her mother shakily grabbing cloths from the drawers.

"Mom, what's going on?" Cream asked innocently. Vanilla swiftly turned around, "No-nothing dear, just go-go back upstairs for a minute okay, okay Cream". Her Mother's tone was panicked and rushed. She wanted to know what had got her mother to act like this, but she did what she was told. After Cream had went upstairs, Vanilla hurried over to Sonic and began cleaning him.

After Vanilla had cleaned him and put a towel under him, she went to get the first aid kit and the phone. She knew Sonic was in serious danger and he would need to be taken to the hospital.

A while had passed and curiosity had gotten the better of Cream and she tip toed down the stairs. She looked around the corner and saw Sonic on the sofa, "*Gasp* So-Sonic!" she squealed. Vanilla ran back into the sitting room.

"Cream! I told you to stay upstairs!" Shouted Vanilla angrily. She rarely got angry at Cream, but she really didn't want her to see Sonic like this. It was not for the young to see.

"I-I'm sorry momma, I had to know what you were worried about." Cream said apologetically.

Vanilla sighed, "It's okay Cream, I... suppose you were going to see him sooner or later. They both looked at Sonic resting on the sofa. Cream tried to hold it in, but she couldn't bear to see her hero looking like this. Even if all the cuts and scars were covered, seeing most of Sonic's body covered in bandages, made her image how much pain Sonic must be in.

"Is *sniffle* Sonic g-gona be okay. What happened to him? You said he was..." She said through tears. Vanilla looked at Sonic in awe. She had been so focused on saving him that she didn't realise what had just happened. Sonic was dead, and now he just appears out of nowhere, covered in blood. That part makes sense, but she had been told there was no body. There was no body at the funeral that confirmed what she had heard

"It...It cant be him, it just... cant" Vanilla thoughts were interrupted when she noticed Cream was gone from her side.

"Cream?" she said looking around her. Just as that was said, Cream appeared from the bottom of the stairs with a blanket. She walked up to Sonic and gently wrapped it around him. "Please get well... Sonic..." said Cream sadly before going back upstairs.

Vanilla watched Cream leave. "Such a kind heart" she thought to herself. She had already bandaged him up and called the hospital. The only thing she could do now was wait and hope.

Vanilla couldn't help but wonder. What happened to his eyes?

ylno nees si tahw namggE tey elbissopmi t'nevah dengis ew


	24. Chapter 24 A Time to Slow Down

**Chapter 27 A Time to Slow Down**

Vanilla and Cream were watch TV while they were waiting for the ambulance to get there. They had moved Sonic upstairs to let him sleep in peace. They had decided to watch the news and were still hoping to hear something about what had happened to Tails and the others. Vanilla was confident Eggman had something to do with it, like always, but if all of the freedom fighters were presumably gone, why hadn't Eggman attacked yet?

"Momma, I think I hear the ambulance truck" Cream said interrupting Vanilla's thoughts. Vanilla walked up to the window and saw the ambulance coming close to the house. A minute or two later, Vanilla heard a ringing sound coming from the door. She quickly moved to the door and opened it. Two guys immediately ran in the door. Vanilla had already told them to go straight upstairs on the right to find Sonic. A girl walked in after that to ask Vanilla a few details. She even asked if she was serious on the phone when she said it was Sonic, obviously very sceptical of a dead hero coming back to life.

The guys came back downstairs looking very confused. "I don't mean to be rude mam, but you said he was upstairs." said one of the guys.

"He is upstairs" Vanilla replied, now looking confused as well. The two guys shared an awkward look before the second guy looked back at Vanilla.

"There's no one up there mam. We checked every room and didn't see any 'Sonic' around." Vanilla looked at him in annoyance, hearing the way he said Sonic.

"Sonic was here. The floor speaks for itself." Vanilla said pointing at the blood on the floor. They continued to look at her like she was a mad in the head.

"Right... well according to the state you said he was in, he couldn't have gotten far. We'll search the rest of the house and around the house for Sonic and if we find nothing, well..." he decided to not finish the sentence and joined his partner in the search. The girl give Vanilla a sympathetic look before going back outside.

Cream, who had went upstairs when the ambulance had gotten there, went downstairs to ask Vanilla what was wrong.

"They think I'm crazy and that Sonic was never here" Vanilla said in complete honesty to Cream. Cream was taken back by here tone of voice.

"But Sonic was here... and... and he needs our help!" Cream said running outside to look for him. Vanilla was about to call her back, but realised it would be pointless. Cream was very worried about Sonic, even more so then herself.

Vanilla walked over to the window and rested her head on her arms, "just what is going on" she said looking into the rainy sky.

Sonic limped through the meadow, feeling a bit better after his nap. Though with all the injury's he's carrying, he'd need much more then a nap to get him healed.

Rain for most animals is very annoying and frustrating, especially for the animals with a lot of fur. But for Sonic, the rain felt incredible. He sighed as he looked up, really loving the rain run down his face.

He had heard the ambulance pull in to Vanilla's house and knew they would be looking for him. He didn't plan on being found though. They longer it took for people to find out about him, the better. Mainly geared towards Eggman and the Shadow Knight.

As he continued to walk, the rain had gotten worse and thunder could be clearly heard every so often. He even saw lightning hit too close for comfort. He was surprised at how his body had handled this and he was soon at his destination, the river. He found irony in his newfound love of water, considering that the Sonic half of him should hate it.

He reached the river and went into it, sitting in the water at the edge of the river, avoiding the pull of it. Sonic closed his eyes and relaxed, deep in thought.

"I made it to the river, now what? This is good, but since I cant go to a hospital to get these injury's taking care of, I'll have to heal them myself, but how?" Sonic rubbed his chin for a bit. Sonic looked up when he heard a rumbling in the sky. His eyes went wide when he saw the thunder was happening right above his head.

"Hopefully that doesn't... or maybe... the water." Sonic thoughts were cut off by a bolt of lightning hitting the river water a bit further down the river. The electricity quickly shot through the water.

"Uh oh" Sonic said as he saw it spread rapidly. The electricity hit him. He gritted his teeth as his body was shocked. It surprisingly wasn't as bad as he thought it would be, and it was over in moments. He exhaled heavily a few times, trying to catch his breath. When he did, he grinned.

"Wow, hehe, that was... interesting" Sonic said looking over himself. He couldn't deny that it hurt his already very damaged body a lot, but he... liked it. It wasn't the pain, it was the shock that he liked. It was like a flame had just been reignited in his body... and he loved it.

Sonic stood up from the river and got out of it. Sonic's smile faded as he remembered the whole reason he did all this.

 **Sonic's POV**

"Pull yourself together Sonic, this is not the time to be smiling, I have a lot of recovering to do. Right after I deal with this Shadow Knight, I'm coming for you Eggman. The Shadow Knight seems to be the biggest threat at the moment, but Eggman is still on my watch list. I know the freedom fighters along with Eggman are trapped in an empty dimension, thanks to the chaos spirit getting into The Shadow Knights little watch room."

I walked up to a tree and smashed my fist into it, "This Shadow Knight has caused too much madness, this time machine must be destroyed. The first thing I need to do is to find and destroy The Shadow Knight. Next thing I have to do is get the freedom fighters out of there. Lastly, I destroy the time machine..."

 **Normal POV**

He mentally face palmed when he realised he didn't even know where the time machine was. Sonic pulled his fist out of the tree. He closed his eyes.

"Energy. The time machine uses a massive amount of energy, to power something like that you would need a huge amount of energy, which means some of it has to be chaos energy. When I recover, maybe, just maybe I can find the source of it, when he goes through the portal."

Sonic opened his eyes and glared into the distance, knowing he had to be patient until he could fight to his full potential once again. All he had to do was wait and perhaps relax while he had a valid reason too. He could do that, and maybe learn more about himself. Sure he had the knowledge of both the spirit of the chaos emeralds and Sonic in his head, the chaos emeralds knowledge being of particular help in understanding his energy and the energy around him. But the difference between knowing something and doing it was huge. After he had felt the electric shock, he knew it was true.

Sonic walked at a slow and steady pace, further into the woods. Nature was something he quickly fell in love with, it was so... peaceful. Sonic didn't give it a second thought and decided to stay in the woods while he recovered. He knew everything about forests, but he had felt so little of it. It was truly a weird feeling, knowing so much and having felt so little. He didn't like the idea of relaxing in the forest while the world was in grave danger, but a part of him knew relaxation was important, especially when your injured bad.

Sonic climbed up a tree. He struggled a bit, but got to the top without falling. He found a strong branch and laid down with his body flat. He shifted his arms around for a bit, not really sure what to do with them. He found that putting them behind his head felt the most natural. After a stressful day, he closed his eyes, thankfully knowing they'll open again.

reven emos eb ezalB tup tuo ? dengis semalf nac


	25. Chapter 25 A Rescue Mission Gone Dark

**Chapter 28 A Rescue Mission Gone Dark**

 **Two weeks later**

The Shadow Knight sat comfortably in his seat watching his favourite program, freedom fighter panic room. Sometimes he found it boring, but Tails usually was up to something interesting. He watched as Tails was using his back up parts scattered in his house to try and make something to what he could only assume to be a way to get out.

"Still hasn't given up yet. He should just accept it, the others look like they have." The Shadow said with a laugh. It was true that they all looked a little lifeless. Knuckles had stopped smashing things and was lying down outside. Amy and Rouge were watching TV. Tails was working in the spare workroom in the basement. Naturally the TV had programs repeating themselves over and over again, but it was better then nothing. Silver had been broken. He was the one that could have saved them if he had reacted to the situation and used his psychokinesis to pull them away from the portal. He had had nightmares about it, not being able to save his friends. Usually Blaze would get him out of this state by telling him there was still hope, but this time she had nothing to say. Just like Silver, Blaze also felt she had failed the group. Not like Silver though, Blaze was haunted by her stupidity in thinking Eggman wouldn't double cross them. It was true that Blaze didn't know if Eggman got out, obviously hoping he didn't. She knew whatever the answer was, Eggman was laughing at her, taunting her, mocking her. That was one thing she could not stand. Being mocked.

"Has anyone seen Cream?" Asked Amy. Everyone in the room lazily looked at Amy with confused expressions. Suddenly Knuckles broke through the door with a grin, "someone said something! It's a plan to escape, right, right!?" Everyone shook their heads at Knuckles. Since being trapped in the dimension, Knuckles had picked up on one thing, no one spoke much anymore and when they did, it was usually a plan of escape. Of course none of them had worked, but it was better then nothing to Knuckles.

"I was wondering had anyone seen Cream. I don't remember her being with us when we came through the portal which means... she's not here!" Amy said with a smile.

"Why are you smiling Amy, what difference does Cream not being here make?" Asked Rouge.

"She can find help and they can get us out of here!" Amy responded.

"And who will she find?" Rouge asked, already knowing that Amy hadn't thought this through at all. Amy paused for a couple of moments.

"Eh... I... don't know" Amy said sadly. Knuckles sighed angrily and stomped out the door. Everyone went back to what they were doing, which was nothing for most of them.

Tails was worn out. He had only one idea left, but it was his best one yet. He had chaos energy in his house that was also in this dimension. He wondered if he had had the seven chaos here, would there be duplicates? He didn't want to think about what would happen if that was true and the Shadow Knight figured out. His plan was to give the chaos energy to Silver and pray that he can use chaos control. He remembered when Sonic had used it with the fake chaos emerald. Since Silver could turn super like Sonic, he hoped he could also use chaos control.

Tails groaned as he tried to amplify the chaos energy. "Even if Silver can use chaos control, it might not work without a full chaos emerald, but this is better then nothing." Tails grabbed the container with care and slowly brought it upstairs, ready to tell the others his plan.

It was nighttime in the woods as Sonic walked through it. He was feeling a lot better after just two short weeks. Anyone else that was in his condition would have been lucky to just be alive. Sonic still didn't feel all his power had returned from when he fought Dark. He still had enough to call this forest 'vacation' off and get to work on finding the portal or an alternative method of getting to the Shadow Knight.

Sonic hadn't attempted to locate the portals energy, but he knew if a bone head like Knuckles could track the Master Emerald, then he could track the chaos energy.

Sonic closed his eyes and tried to remember how it worked. "Clear your mind Sonic, you can do it" Sonic said quietly. He continued this for about a minute, finding the whole thing a little boring. Sonic snapped his eyes open, "got it".

Sonic got into a running stance and smirked, "lets see what these great legs can do" Sonic said rubbing his feet on the floor a little before starting in a light jog in the direction of the chaos energy. As he went further, he increased his speed. He did it again and again until he had become a blur to anyone who saw. Sonic still didn't want anyone to know about him, which was why he had decided to go at night.

After running for quite a bit he had found the source. "Angel Island, surprise, surprise. What's it doing in the sea though." Sonic said curiously. He had missed a lot of events, including Eggman taking the master emerald. Sonic then decided to run back to Tails workshop and get the tornado.

After a half an hour of flying, he made it to angel island. Sonic found an open space and landed the tornado. It was a bit of a bumpy landing, but he thankfully didn't crash the plane. Sonic focused again to really narrow down the location of the energy. He led him to a random part of the forest.

"What the... where is it?" Sonic looked around the area, but couldn't find anything resembling a portal. He focused again, this time he found the energy quickly. Sonic looked at the ground below him.

"Underground..." he murmured before looking around for some kind of button. He looked inside the near tree trunks, figuring that would be the best spot to hide a button. His intuition had been right. He tapped the button and the ground moved aside, revealing a staircase. Sonic walked down the staircase cautiously. At the bottom of the staircase, there was a big room with two giant portals at the end against the wall. Sonic decided to check everything before he went through the portal. The first thing that caught his eye was a cloth covering something big. Sonic then noticed it was glowing.

"That shape..." Sonic said before pulling off the cloth. Sonic shunned his eyes from the light. "The Master Emerald, I knew it. I wonder if that idiot left the chaos emeralds lying around here too."

Sonic went through every drawer and shelf, almost tearing the whole place down. "Dammit, I guess he has some brain cells after all". Sonic muttered under his breath. He walked back into the centre of the room and found the control station. It took him a minute to get his head around what each button did. It didn't really matter at the moment what most of the buttons did. In the centre of the buttons was a computer that did most of the work. Sonic looked for a bit until he found the last location used.

"Portal control centre eh, sounds like the place" Sonic turned on the portal and entered the destination. While looking on the computer, he had found the time machine section of the portal.

"So the one on the right is the time machine. This is easier then I thought it would be, since the time travelling has it's own portal designed for it, I can just destroy the portal and no more time travelling." Sonic smirked and got to work. He turned off the portal and started spin dashing the time portal at all angles, slicing it into pieces. Then for the next thirty or so minutes, Sonic found any blueprint related to time travel and destroyed it. Satisfied that the time machine could not be remade, he turned the portal back on and got ready.

Sonic did a little stretch of the legs and arms before standing up and frowning again.

"Time to get to work" Sonic hopped through the portal.

The Shadow Knight had the chaos emeralds behind glass, glowing furiously from being so close to each other.

"I have the master emerald, I have the Chaos emeralds, I have the freedom fighters trapped, I even have eggman trapped! The multiverse will be mine and no one can stop me!" He paused dramatically. He looked around him curiously. Sonic then dropped in from the non existing roof a few feet in front of him. The Shadow Knight stood up and grinned.

"You know something Sonic, when i saw you down in my portal room, I freaked out. Sonic had come back from the dead, hehehe, but then I realised something". He waited for Sonic to ask what, but after he got no reply he continued on, "I have nothing to fear. I'm superior to you in every way. I'm faster, I'm cooler and I'm far stronger then you will ever be" The Shadow Knight pointed his finger at Sonic and smirked.

Sonic examined him for a bit, "Oh... I think recognise that ego. Your that weakling Scourge, if I'm not mistaken." Sonic said in matter of fact way. The Shadow Knight opened his mouth in shock and anger.

"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME"! He shouted furiously. Sonic grinned and tapped the side of his head a few times, "Angered very easily, definitely Scourge." Sonic said tauntingly. Scourge throw off his helmet in anger, "Your and your new white stripes dare talk to me like that. I'll pulverise you!" Scourge got into a fighting stance. Sonic mirrored Scourges stance and grinned. Scourge quickly jumped and homing attacked Sonic. Sonic dodged to the side.

"Careful, you'll destroy your precious monitors." Sonic said. Scourge tried spin dashing Sonic, but Sonic jumped over it. Scourge homing attacked Sonic multiple times, but Sonic kept jumping to the other side of the room.

"Would you stop jumping around and fight me" Scourge shouted. Sonic smirked. Scourge did a spin dash at Sonic again. This time when Sonic jumped over it, Scourge quickly homing attacked him while he was in the air. Sonic was hit into one of the monitors.

"Ouch" Sonic teased as he slowly got off the cracked screen. Trying to take advantage of the situation, Scourge attempted to homing attack Sonic again. Sonic jumped to his feet and jumped over his head again. Scourge smashed into the screen and a static sound could be heard. Scourge noticed this and tried to get away. The screen exploded, causing a knock on effect that blew up all the monitors. Scourge was sent to far side of the room by the explosion. He rolled up next to Sonic's feet. Sonic pulled out a button and opened the portal back to Mobius. He threw Scourge in before jumping in himself.

As soon as Sonic landed, he was punched to the floor. Sonic jumped back to his feet like he wasn't even hit.

"What the" Scourge stepped backwards in shock. Sonic grabbed him by the throat and glared at him. Scourge started sweating a little, this was not what he expected. Sonic held him there for a few seconds waiting for Scourge to resist. Scourge grinned. Sonic then put his hand to Scourge's chest. Before Scourge could say anything, Sonic shot a beam through his chest. Scourge went wide eyed and made a choking sound, but didn't say anything. Sonic dropped him to the ground and looked down at him. Scourge fell on his knees putting his hands against his chest. It didn't last long though, and in about three seconds he fell to the side.

"W-what i-is this" Scourge said coughing blood all over the floor.

"This is what happens when you think that I won't do anything to threaten your life. You could have broke out of my hold, but you didn't because you believe me to be nothing more then a 'hero' and an idiot that would never kill you even when given the chance." Sonic grabbed Scourge and lifted him so they were face to face. It was just then when Scourge saw Sonic's eyes staring right into his, he noticed that they were a Silvery colour

"You thought wrong" Sonic said darkly and kicked Scourge into the wall. Sonic didn't look back once at Scourge and jumped through the portal, leaving Scourge in the wall. Scourge, with a pure look of shock, watched as Sonic left him there, left him there helpless. Before his mind could even comprehend what had just happened in the last five minutes, his head fell to the side and his eyes shut.

tneserp, si a ekil niap ? ot ew teg ew evig tahw dengis tnaw


	26. Chapter 26 Freedom

**Chapter 29 Freedom**

Tails had just finished telling everyone his big plan to escape. The response was quite positive, except for Silver who wasn't really sure if he could pull it off.

"Come on Silver, if you can go super just like Sonic and Shadow could, then you can teleport too." Tails urged. Everyone else nodded in agreement. Blaze walked up to Silver and put her hand on his shoulder, "You can do this Silver, I know you can". Silver put his head down for a second before confidently looking back at Blaze.

"Okay, I'll do it"! Silver said. Blaze stepped back with the others to give Silver some room. Silver walked over to the table and picked up the container containing the chaos energy.

"Remember Silver, when you open the container, the chaos energy will go straight into you. Once you feel the energy, you'll only get one chance at this so take your time, but not too much or you might lose the energy." Tails instructed Silver. Silver breathed out and in with his mouth a few times before opening the container. True to what Tails had said, the chaos energy jumped into Silver's body. Silver went wide eyed.

"Whoa, that's... intense. I could swap that out for coffee in the morning." Silver said with a light chuckle. Blaze frowned.

"Focus Silver! You only get one shot at this!" Blaze said firmly. Before Silver could attempt it, there was a knock at the door. Everyone went quiet and stared at the door. Assuming it was the wind they returned their eyes to Silver until another knock was heard.

"Um... is everyone here? Rouge said, making everyone look around and count each other.

"Everyone's here, so I'll... answer it?" Amy said uncertainly. The only response was a shrug from Knuckles. Amy sighed and walked over to the door and turning the handle. She opened the door and saw something that made her freeze with her mouth open.

"Hi." Sonic said with a smile. Amy continued to stare at Sonic with her mouth open, completely zoned out. Rouge was starting to wonder what was taking Amy and walked over to her.

"Amy, you know there's no one..." Rouge began, but stopped when she saw Sonic. "Oh... my... god" Rouge said.

"Do you mind if I come in?" Sonic asked. Rouge slowly shook her head. Sonic walked in and waved to the rest of them.

"SONIC!" They shouted in surprise. Amy had finally came back to reality and grinned widely before jumping onto Sonic and hugging his chest tightly. Everyone else stared at Sonic in shock.

"Sonic, is that... really you? Tails asked, silencing the whispers from everyone else. Sonic grinned and rubbed his nose.

"The one and only! Now that this is out of the way, come with me." Sonic said as he attempted to move towards the door, but realised Amy was still clutching his chest.

"Do you mind letting me go Amy?" Sonic said calmly. Amy shook her head and squeezed him tighter.

"I'm never letting you go again! Amy squealed in happiness, squeezing Sonic even tighter.

"That's enough Amy, I don't think he can breathe." Knuckles said, but Amy ignored him. Sonic took Amy's arms and pulled them off him.

"Huh?" Amy said in surprise, opening her eyes to find Sonic walking outside. Sonic had never done that before, and when she did let him go, he'd usually be gasping for air. "I was holding him tighter then I usually do, and he just shrugged me off with ease. Has he been working out while we were down here... Amy wondered.

Sonic lead them outside. Knuckles smiled widely when he saw the portal just mere metres away. Everyone else saw it and immediately started cheering and giving each other high fives. Tails went up to Sonic.

"I can't believe this. This... this is incredible Sonic! You saved us!" Tails said wagging his 'tails' happily. Sonic smiled, but said nothing. Tails put his hand up. Sonic caught on and gave Tails a gentle high five. Tails continued to stare at Sonic, still unable to believe that Sonic was standing in front of him. He looked very strange and had a similar stripe pattern as Shadow now, but Tails and the others were too overcome with joy to question it right now.

Once they had calmed down a bit, Sonic ushered them towards the portal. One by one they hopped through it. Knuckles turned around in front of the portal and gave a middle finger before hopping backwards. Silver laughed while Blaze snickered to herself. They both jumped through, leaving just Sonic. He then jumped through to meet the others.

Sonic landed on his feet and saw everyone else still cheering and celebrating. Sonic felt something he hadn't felt yet. He couldn't describe it that well, but it gave him the urge to smile and cheer along with them. He was happy to just smile though, it felt like enough.

"Whoa! What happened to the wall?" Knuckles asked. Sonic paused, he had returned when he realised he left Scourge in a very unsightly manner and had moved him. He knew the wall would raise questions so needed to choose his words carefully.

"This is were I fought the Shadow Knight, and that wall was the end of him." Sonic said.

"Who was it? Behind the helmet I mean." Rouge asked.

"Scourge" Sonic replied. Everyone groaned. "Don't worry, I took care of him."

"How did you beat him Sonic? I mean your supposed to be evenly matched. What gave you the edge" Tails asked curiously. Tails knew if they had just went head to head, Sonic would be in a bad condition at best.

"He was an arrogant idiot. it was over before it even began, that's all you need to know. Anyway, it's time to get out of here." Sonic said seriously. He began walking towards the stairs, "wait just a second Sonic" Silver began. Sonic turned around and lifted an eyebrow.

"I haven't stopped wondering about something since you got back and I'm amazed no one else has said anything yet. What is up with those new stripes? Don't get me wrong, I like em, but they don't look like tattoos, they look just like Shadow's stripes, just a different colour. Also, you just came back from the dead, what the hell! What's up with that?" Silver asked desperately in need of an answer.

"I'm surprised you haven't asked as well. When you saw me get blasted, I didn't die. The beam he shot me with had chaos energy in it. In my desperate state I was able to harness the power and use chaos control to get out of there. About the stripes thing, I think it was some kind of side effect of the blast, but I don't know for sure." Sonic finished.

The answer seemed to make sense and went around well with almost everyone.

"Your not telling us everything, are you Sonic? Knuckles asked sceptically. When Sonic didn't respond, Knuckles continued, "I know I'm not the smartest guy around, but I know about this stuff and I don't believe you appeared with stripes after being shot."

Sonic glared at Knuckles,"you can believe me or not knuckles, It doesn't change my answer." Sonic said. Knuckles glared back at Sonic.

"Okay guys, that's enough. We've all had a hard time lately so lets just head to my house and relax a bit, okay everyone." Tails said. They nodded in agreement.

Back at Tails house, Amy was helping Tails with the cooking while the others sat down at the dining table. They had all decided to stay an hour or two relieve the stress they had on their shoulders lately. Even Rouge reluctantly agreed to stay for the meal. Rouge was chatting with Knuckles, mostly annoying him. Silver and Blaze began their conversation on the topic of Eggman, but drifted into lighter topics. This left Sonic to himself. He had overheard Silver and Blazes Eggman conversation and knew the answer.

Sonic fiddled with his fork a bit, having not used one before. After Rouge had had her fun annoying Knuckles, she turned her attention to Sonic.

"Your not very chatty. What's got ya quiet big blue?" she asked jokingly. Sonic glared at her for a few seconds before looking down. Rouge actually got the chills from Sonic's stare.

"Come on Sonic, don't be so moody. I already have Shadow for that, well, when I find him that is." Rouge said a bit sadly. Sonic eyes shot up.

"I know where Shadow is" Sonic said. Rouge ears perked. "Really!? Where is he then?" Rouge asked with a smile.

"He's with Eggman. I know because I felt his chaos control. He used it to get back to mobius with Eggman along side him." Sonic said. Silver and Blaze stopped their conversation and looked at Sonic.

"Eggman got back! With Shadow working for him." Silver said in surprise. Sonic nodded. The table went silent.

Tails and Amy came in with plates, "Foods ready!"

drawer txen ,krow seno .ssergorp evisserpmI eht anog era ruoy


	27. Chapter 27 Connecting

**Author's Note**

I just want to mention something important. This is the last chapter that will be up for a while. I don't know how long though, it all depends on how fast my editing is. I'm going to be remastering my older chapters (basically making my first chapters not be cringe to read, mainly chapter 1). I haven't decided yet, but I'm probably going to merge chapter 1 and 2, just because they're so short. I pay attention to my views I get on each chapter and I've seen a big issue. I don't expect everyone who starts reading my story to continue, a lot of people aren't going to be interested from the beginning and that's fine. Everyone has their preferences and it's just not for them, but my first chapter is definitely putting a bad name to the rest of the story. I still have a long way to go in writing, but reading that chapter again, I turn my head away in shame. If I went into a story, and that was the first chapter, I don't think I'd continue. Hopefully, I'll be able to fix all the horrible mistakes soon so I can get back to the story. For everyone who has read the story to this point, thanks for the support, I wouldn't have the motivation without you. Anyway, enjoy Chapter 30!

 **Chapter 30 Connecting**

The friends spent the rest of the night eating, drinking and connecting with each other again. They were rarely all together like this unless Eggman was up to something big. Unfortunately, with the danger of Eggman still being on the loose, the friendly atmosphere had changed very quickly. After a bit of a panic, they decided it was best to enjoy the big gathering of friends and focus on Eggman tomorrow. It was agreed that they'd meet at Tails house, as it was the usually gathering point when Eggman was on their minds. Tails hoped the fallout that had occurred would have been forgotten by now. It hadn't. Knuckles was still holding a grudge and left early. Amy did her usual flirting with Sonic, which was completely ignored. This led to Amy's annoyance, which reminded her of how she was angry at the rest of them and she left as well. True to what Rouge had said, she left after the meal. Tails was just going to have to do it with three short, not that those three were always helping, but still. Sonic hadn't said much, but he did say to not mention to anyone that he was alive. They were confused by this, but agreed.

Tails had just finished waving goodbye to Silver and Blaze when he sighed. "It's a pity that Knuckles and Amy aren't going to be here helping tomorrow, huh" Tails said to Sonic who was zipping through news channels. Sonic then stood up and headed for the door.

"Uh... Sonic, what are doing?" Tails asked.

"I'm going for a run" Sonic replied.

"Are you not tired Sonic? I mean it's like one in the morning, and your going for a run?" He questioned. Sonic sighed.

"I'll be back soon. Get yourself some rest, you look like you could use it" Sonic said before opening the door and leaving. Tails was surprised at this, he had never seen Sonic run this late at night. Sometimes he ran in the dark hours, but not after a battle, especially with someone like Scourge. He had said it was easy, but Tails just assumed he was showing off, perhaps he really had beaten Scourge easily. "How bizarre" Tails thought before heading to bed after such a long day.

Sonic had begun with a light jog, but as he got further into the forest he increased his speed. His feet were enjoying a lovely run, but his mind was bent on finding Eggman. "Since the last time his base was wrecked, he appears to have used his giant ship as his base. If I were Eggman, were would I be..." Sonic mind spent the next while thinking of possible locations for Eggman to be, but since he was most likely in his ship, he would be very hard to track him down.

After he found a good clearing, he stopped and had a look around until he spotted his first target. He put his hand up and aimed to at the bolder. The stripe on his arm started to glow as he charged a ball of energy in his hand. When he was satisfied, he concentrated for a few seconds before splitting the energy ball into three smaller ones. He started to make them circle in front of his hand. He then shot each of them, one at a time at the bolder. Before each one hit, he pulled it up and moved it above the bolder and let it hover. Once each one was in place, which was a triangle formation that surrounded the bolder from all sides. Satisfied, Sonic shot all three energy blasts at the bolder at once, creating a big explosion.

Sonic shielded his eyes a bit and quickly went over to stomp out the fire on the grass. It didn't cause the same fire damage as Eggman's rockets did, but he still needed to make sure to be careful practising near trees. There was no need to be destroying trees while practising if it wasn't necessary.

Sonic looked down at his hands. "Much better then last time. There is still much to practise, but that'll do for now. I should head back." Sonic finished his thoughts and made his way back home.

Tails awoke with a yawn, stretching his arms and legs. He took a quick shower before heading downstairs to make breakfast. After a few minutes he called out to Sonic, "foods ready!" he shouted to Sonic, who he assumed was still in bed. He sat down to eat, waiting for Sonic to come down. He was about to call him again when Sonic walked through the door and sat down besides Tails.

"I thought you were in bed. How many hours of sleep did you get?" Tails asked. Sonic finished his slice of toast before responding, "Enough, when are they coming over for our tactics meeting?" he asked.

"At noon." Tails responded. Sonic returned to his meal with nothing else to say. Once they had finished their meals, Sonic went to the door,

"Wait, Sonic, before you go on your morning run, maybe we can do something fun!" Tails said cheerily. Sonic thought about it for a second.

"I guess we have some time to burn before we concentrate on Eggman. What do you propose?" Sonic asked, folding his arms. Tails grinned before frowning in thought. He clicked his fingers, "Lets play some video games, and after that, you can decide what we do next." Tails said excitedly booting up the console.

Sonic watched in curiosity at Tails sudden enthusiasm. "What are you so giddy about"? Sonic asked. Tails finished setting the game up and looked at Sonic briefly before looking to the side, he fiddled with his fingers and shuffled his feet and 'Tails' around awkwardly.

"I... I missed you, Sonic. I... I..." Tails suddenly dashed forward into Sonic's stomach, catching him completely off guard. He wrapped his arms around Sonic's stomach and nestled his head against Sonic's chest as tears ran down his cheeks.

"I missed you so, so much. I prayed that you were okay, I hoped you would come back. I kept telling myself you would be fine because you were Sonic, a hero... my hero... Tails trailed off, still holding onto Sonic. He didn't want to look like this in front of Sonic, but he couldn't hold it back anymore. Sonic stared down at Tails, not really sure how to respond to this situation. He did know that Tails needed to let go soon, he wasn't a cuddling toy. When Tails didn't let go, he gently pried Tails from him. Tails looked up at him, hurt in his eyes. Sonic felt a bit bad now, knowing that wasn't the right response.

"Oh, um... well I'm back now so... ya..." Sonic trailed off. Tails still looked at him, almost guilt tripping him. Sonic paused for a few seconds before he walked up to Tails and ruffling the bangs on his head. Tails closed one of his eyes and chuckled.

"Okay, okay, I'm cheered up! He said in between chuckles." Sonic smirked, letting go of Tails head and sitting down in front of the screen. Tails joined him.

"You want me to remind you of the controls? Tails asked, giving Sonic the controller. Sonic took the controller in his hands, looking at all the buttons. He looked back at the screen, a smile creeping onto his face.

"No thanks, I think I'll catch on." Sonic replied.


	28. Chapter 28 The Plan

**Author's Note**

I just want to address the chapter title issue real quick. Because I deleted some chapters, (that weren't about the story) the chapter numbers got messed up. At the start of the last chapter, I have put chapter 30, which is wrong. It is actually 27. So this will be named 28 which will look weird after reading the last one that had read 30, but in a few chapters it will be fine. Really sorry about this, in order for me to fix the issue completely, I would have rewrite tons of chapters, and I would much prefer writing new ones. I hope that people don't get too annoyed by this. Anyway, enjoy the chapter!

 **Chapter 28 The Plan**

After Sonic and Tails had finished playing video games, it was now Sonic's turn to pick an activity. Tails turned off the TV and turned to Sonic with a smile. "That was great. How'd you like the game, Sonic?" Tails asked.

"It was... interesting." Sonic replied. Not the answer Tails was expecting, but he also wasn't surprised that Sonic had said something he usually wouldn't. He had no idea what Sonic had been doing for that month, but it obviously changed him a lot, mentally and physically. Like Knuckles, Tails didn't buy Sonic's story about how he got the stripes. He knew there was something bigger going on with Sonic. It was like he was a different person all of a sudden. Sonic was keeping something big from him, and he was going to figure out what.

"So, Sonic, what do you want to do now? We have another forty five minutes to spare." Tails asked. "Well... how about a little sparing match?" Sonic said. This surprised Tails. He was expecting an answer like running. "I don't know, Sonic... Tails said, not sure if he'd want to fight this new Sonic.

"Relax, I'll go easy, okay" Sonic said reassuringly. Tails frowned at this. "Hey! Don't treat me like a weakling. I'll show you!" Tails said putting his hands up. Sonic smiled, putting his fists up as well. Tails gulped nervously. "Perhaps I should have chose my words more carefully" he thought.

Tails rushed forward and flung his fist at Sonic's face. Sonic easily sidestepped out of the way, causing Tails to fall forward. Tails got back up and turned around to see Sonic with a bored look on his face. Tails ran forward and delivered a torrent of punches, but Sonic used the palms of his hands to block them with ease. Tails growled. "Stop teasing me!" Tails shouted and ran at Sonic again. This time he jumped above Sonic and slashed his 'Tails' down on Sonic's head. However, as soon as Sonic was hit, he quickly grabbed both of his 'Tails'.

"Hey! Put me down!" Tails shouted as Sonic held him upside down with one hand. "Sorry, Tails, but unless you do something, you'll have to wait until the rides over." Sonic said with a grin. "Wait, what ride?" Tails said in confusion.

Sonic slowly began spinning Tails around in a circle. Tails started getting really dizzy as Sonic increased the speed. "S-S-onic, s-stop, I g-give up" Tails said as the speed was almost hurting him now. Hearing Tails' plea, Sonic began to slow down, until he stopped completely. He gently let Tails to the floor. Tails began rolling on the floor, holding his head a little. Sonic folded his arms and shook his head disapprovingly.

"When was the last time you fought Eggman without you tornado or gadgets?" Sonic asked. Tails had finally snapped out of his dizzy state and was now sitting up. "Ugh, a while. Tails said with a groan. "I don't think I wanna spar with you again."

"I understand that fighting head to head isn't your style, but you need to be able to defend yourself in combat, Tails. Your friends aren't always going to be your shield in fights, I suggest you ask Knuckles to give you lessons on hand to hand. That's seems to be his strong area." Sonic said before heading back into the house. Tails thought about it for a second, until a light bulb went off in his head.

"W-wait, Sonic. Maybe you can train me" Tails asked. Sonic stopped and turned around. He gave it a brief thought. "If we find Eggman today, you stick with me and watch and learn. Don't just watch me though, watch the others too. Then I'll see what I can do to help you improve" Sonic instructed. Tails shook his head. "Your're saying that I should just watch and not fight, that's ridiculous, Sonic. You just caught me off guard, I'll be ready for Eggman!" Tails said enthusiastically. Tails smile faded when he say Sonic gave him a stern look.

"Do as you wish, Tails. Your're the leader of the group now. It's not my place to tell you what to do, but if you go out there in the form your're in, it won't end well." Sonic said before he went back inside. Stunned, Tails didn't move for a few moments.

 **Tails POV**

"Have I really become that bad at fighting. Is Sonic right about me? Will I be a burden if I don't just stay in the tornado. He's right though, I have become rusty, but this isn't like him at all. Even if I was the worst fighter in the world, he'd never say it to me. He'd just say something encouraging and give me a grin and a thumbs up. I Have to find out what happened to Sonic while we were gone, but if he won't confess what happened, then I'll have to get it from someone else." I thought about it for a while as I cleaned the house. "There is one person that has the answers. Eggman. If this all happened to Sonic because of Eggman's beam, then he must knows why Sonic's appearance has changed and why he's acting so out of character. I wonder... what really happened with Scourge...

 **Normal POV**

Tails thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a door bell. Tails answered the door and was greeted by Silver and Blaze.

"Hi guys, come on in" Tails said, letting them in. They took their seats in the living room, where Sonic was already waiting. Tails brought out some drinks and began the conversation. "I think I have a good idea on how to find Eggman." Tails began, but was interrupted by Silver. "That won't be necessary, we know where Eggman is." Silver said. Tails perked up at the sound of that.

"Really!? Where, and how did you find out!? Tails said eagerly. Silver grinned. "He's on an small island. Me and Blaze will direct you there so you don't have to worry about it. I think it would be better to keep the surprise of who told us until we get there."

Sonic stood up. "Lets go".

"Wait, What about the plan?" Tails said, standing up as well.

"We have the location, so we can talk on the way, now lets move". Tails went outside and got the Tornado ready. They hoped in and began their journey to the island. The weather got worse as they travelled further out into the sea, memories of the ride to Angel island flashed through Tails' head. Luckily, there was just rain and the wind wasn't too rough. After a bit of talking, they decided to split up. Silver and Blaze were going to crash the front entrance while Sonic and Tails sneaked from the back of the base. It was Blaze's plan, but Sonic volunteered to go with Tails and sneak around instead of the other two.

As they approached, Tails slowed the plane down and hovered it above the water. "What are you doing, Tails?" asked Silver. Tails pressed a few buttons and took out a life jacket. "We cant go to close or Eggman will surely spot us on his radar. We can swim the rest of the way. Don't worry, Sonic, I didn't forget" Tails said, handing Sonic the life jacket, who put it on without question.

"So remember team, get in, get the master emerald and get out, got it" Tails said. They nodded their heads and got ready to go. They jumped in, except for Sonic, who was a bit spaced out. Silver and Blaze swam ahead, Tails waiting behind for Sonic.

"Come on, Sonic. I know you hate the water, but with the life jacket on, you'll be fine!" Tails reassured Sonic. Sonic paused for second before diving in. Tails smiled and continued on at a slow pace, watching behind him to make sure Sonic was doing okay. At first, Sonic couldn't get himself to move properly, but as he watched Tails, he began to go faster. He started copying Tails so well in fact, he was practically in sync with Tails.

"Wow, you actually got it, Sonic! Keep going". Tails said in praise and confusion. Sonic then increased his speed and was gaining on Tails. "I don't believe it..." Tails thought as Sonic began overtaking him. Sonic turned to face Tails and began going backwards. "You were right, Tails. This is pretty easy" Sonic said with a grin, before turning around again. Tails frowned, but it was quickly replaced with a smile. He started spinning his Tails slowly. It was harder to do underwater, but Tails got his 'Tails' going and was now going far ahead of Sonic. The water was pushed back into Sonic's face, causing him to slow down.

"Sorry, Sonic. You may be faster then me on foot, but in the sky's and water, I'm the faster one" Tails said with a chuckle as he lifted himself completely out of the water and flew way ahead of Sonic.

Sonic smiled, "I'm glad our fight didn't affect his confidence. I just hope he has substance to back it up. Anyway, that's enough of that". Sonic then jumped out of the water and burst into max speed, sending water in every direction. He easily overtook Tails and was just about able to stop at the beach without crashing into the trees on the other side. Silver and Blaze luckily jumped out of the way of the destructive force. Sonic turned around and grinned. Tails flew up to them with an annoyed look.

"Show off" Tails muttered under his breath, annoyed to see the one part of Sonic he could do without, had stayed exactly the same.

"Now can you tell us who told you about the base?" Sonic asked. Silver opened his mouth to answer, but a different voice spoke.

"You guys look like you could use a detective right about now"


	29. Chapter 29 Fortress Break in part 1

**Chapter 29 Fortress Break in part 1**

"A detective, like me!" Vector said with a bow. Charmy flew around cheering while Espio just clapped slowly. Sonic and Tails were confused, but ended up just going with it.

"So how did you find Eggman's base, Vector?" Tails asked. Vector grinned, "I know it's easy to assume that the detective Vector would be the one to have found out, but it was actually Espio who spotted an eggman ship heading here. We then grabbed a boat and made our way over there, Char-"

"Wait a second, you just grabbed a boat? What boat?" Tails interrupted. "Hey! Don't interrupt me when I'm talking about our detective adventures" Vector quickly coughed and continued, "As I was saying, Charmy stayed to tell Silver and Blaze before coming over to meet with us. So here we are." Vector finished.

With that out of the way, they reviewed their plan of attack. Sadly, the chaotix had some other 'business' to attend to, and couldn't join them. Vector and Espio made their way to the boat, with Silver behind them. "Are you sure you guys can't help. We're a little short on numbers and this place is massive. We could really use your help" Silver said, trying to persuade them to stay.

"I know our expertise are greatly sought after, but detective duty calls." Vector said before he left with the others. Silver walked back over to the others.

"Well, I guess we have no reinforcements" Silver said, disappointed. Tails shrugged, "Maybe it's for the best. Apart from Espio, they wouldn't be much of a help. Not that Vector and Charmy are weak or anything, but they're not exactly..." Tails trailed off.

"Stealthy" Sonic said.

"Quiet" Blaze said.

Tails nodded, "Yeah, those things. Okay guys, hands in!" Tails said putting his hand in front of him. There was an awkward silence as no one put their hand in. Tails' smile faded. He took his hand back. "Come on guys! This is a team effort, and this is a big mission. Who's with me!" Tails again put his hand out. This time, Silver put his hand in. "For peace!". Tails smiled and looked at the other two.

Sonic and Blaze exchanged a glance, before putting their hands in as well. They all put their hands in the air and then broke apart. They wished each other good luck and went their different ways. Silver and Blaze made their way towards the front of the fortress, while Sonic and Tails quickly made their way around the back, while keeping hidden among the trees. Silver floated through the air with Blaze sprinted through the forest. As they got closer, they spotted a ton of robots on patrol. Sticking to the plan, Blaze jumped out and shot a couple of fire balls at the robots. Silver landed on a branch and levitated two of the robots and smashed them against each other, destroying both of them. Silver and Blaze looked up at the sound of an alarm. The front entrance opened and robots began pouring out. Two of them were big bulky ones with shields with an Eggman crest on their chest.

"Intruder alert! You lot come with me!" Commander two spoke, pointing to a bunch of smaller robots. Commander three proceeded to take another bunch. Another robot then emerged from the entrance. It also had a shield, but with a huge rocket cannon on top. All three of them had heavy armour, but number one had the strongest

" The Rest of you, come with me!" Commander one ordered. They spread out into the forest, with the intention of leaving no room for the enemy to sneak around them. Little did they know, Sonic and Tails were hiding behind a tree at the back, listening to the loud sound of the robots moving. Tails listened for a bit longer before the sound was fading.

"Well, we could hear them from all the way back here, so I'd say that the coast is clear enough for us to sneak in the back" Sonic nodded in agreement. Tails walked up to the gigantic wall. "Now how do we get in the back without setting off an alarm? Tails said, more to himself then to Sonic. They both began thinking. "There's no way to get through that wall without setting off some kind of alarm, and we cant break through the door either" Tails thought.

"I have an idea. When I break through the wall, you quickly find the vent system on the ceiling. When the robots come, they'll think it's just me and you'll be able to sneak around like a ghost. As a bonus, seeing me will give Eggman the shivers" Sonic said with a smirk. Tails thought about it for a moment. "That's... actually a great plan. Lets do it!"

Sonic went into a ball and began charging up. He then launched himself at the wall and smashed straight through. As expected, light went off in the room and cameras started popping up and locking onto Sonic. Sonic dodged multiply lasers from the cameras. He jumped up and punched one. He then used the walls to spring himself to the next camera, until he smashed through the last one. Before reinforcements arrived, Tails flew through the broken wall and went into the air vent. Sonic ran to the next room, only to be met with robots. Sonic smirked before dashing towards them...

Eggman sat at the top floor with an annoyed look. He looked into the camaras off the spy bots and saw that Silver and Blaze were still dealing with Commander two's group. "Errr, have commander one and three found the others yet" Eggman growled in frustration. "No sir, but Sonic has been spotted on the ground floor in room 26." One of the robots responded. Eggman froze. He didn't move for a couple of seconds before slowly turning his head to the robot.

"What did you say!?" Eggman said in a stunned voice. "Sonic has been spotted on the ground floor in room 26." The robot repeated. Eggman's whole body suddenly felt very weak. He stumbled while getting off the chair. He fell to his knees. He started breathing heavily, his hands shaking against the floor. He rose slowly, using the table as a support. He glared into the monitor. "Catch the fiend who dares to paint himself in the blue rodents colour." The robot nodded and sent more robots to Sonic's location. "I know that's not him, it can't be, it just can't!" Eggman said, trying to reassure himself, but failing. Even though all cameras were now broken, he had seen Sonic in action and there was only one other rodent who moved close to that, and he was currently on the second floor and under his control.

Eggman slammed his fist down on the table. "First that prick Scourge gets here and tries to get the master emerald, and now them. Luckily, Scourge got the fake, and thankfully this place his been upgraded since last time." Eggman thought.

Blaze shot a steam of fire at Commander two, but it was blocked by his shield. Commander two shot a laser beam at Blaze. She dodged out of the way and started running around the robot, shooting fire at him as she did. The robot tried to follow her with it's shield, but she was much faster then him. Commander two's body started to heat up, making his armour weaker. Blaze stopped and shot a fire ball at Commander two as a distraction, letting her run around him with ease. She went over to Silver.

Silver was busy cleaning up the flying bots by smashing them into each other. Silver floated down to Blaze. "How's it going with the big guy?" He asked. Blaze put her hands on her knees and sighed. "I used up a lot of energy dealing with that annoying shield, but now I think I have his mid body damaged enough. Any ideas on finishing him?" Blaze asked. They then heard load stomping. They both turned around to see the big robot trudging towards them.

"How about I smash his sides with two tree trunks, then you slice him with you fire spin." Silver said. "Sounds good." Blaze took a couple of steps. Silver grabbed the two trees beside him with his psychokinesis, ripping them out of the ground. Commander two ran up to Silver and attempted to step on him. Silver moved out of the way and flew up over him. Silver quickly positioned the trees to the sides of the robot. Commander two aimed his hand at Silver. Before it could shoot, two large tree trunks were slammed into it's sides. The robot looked down to see his body was a third of its width and had sparks coming out of it.

"NOW BLAZE"! Silver shouted. Blaze put her arms out straight and started spinning. Once she had picked up enough speed, her body lit up and she charged at the robot standing a few feet away. The robot quickly looked up to see a spinning flame coming right for him. Before he could slam his shield down in front of him, Blaze had slipped underneath it. With nothing left in her way, she hit the robots core and began slicing through it. She continued until she had ripped the robots chest completely open. She spun out the other side and she quickly ran, knowing what was going to happen.

""Impossible!" Commander two shouted before turning around and shooting a rocket at Blaze. Blaze jumped over it. The robot was about to fire another one, but just then, his core exploded, blowing the entire robot into a million tiny pieces. Blaze and Silver ducked to avoid the impact of the blast. Silver flew over to Blaze.

"Nicely done Blaze!" Silver said with a grin. Blaze smiled. "Thanks, but I needed your set up for it to work. So I think you deserve half the credit." Silver put his fist out. Blaze rolled her eyes, putting her fist out and gently hitting it against Silver's.

"Sir, bad news. Commander Two had been destroyed."


	30. Chapter 30 Fortress Break in part 2

**Chapter 30 Fortress Break in part 2**

Eggman tapped his fingers impatiently on the table. "Okay, that's it! Where is the status report from 1 and 3! He shouted. Orbot and Cubot came back into the room. Eggman immediately pounced onto Orbot.

"Where have you two good for nothing scraps of metal been all this time" Eggman said while shaking Cubot.

"We were on holiday" Orbot said. Eggman glared at them. Obviously not remembering giving two robots a holiday, but he had more important things on his mind at the moment. "Whatever, not start working and get me a status report!" Eggman slammed his fist down, once again taking his anger out on the table. Orbot and Cubot got to work on getting the update on the situation. Orbot put it on the screen for Eggman to see.

"So 2 was destroyed. Silver and Blaze are proving to be quite the nuisance. Since 1 and 3 haven't found anyone else, send them back to get rid of those two." Eggman said. Orbot nodded and sent the message. Eggman grinned, knowing that a nasty surprise was waiting for Sonic.

* * *

Sonic ran quickly through the halls, looking everywhere for the master emerald. The robots had lost track of where he was, since he was going so fast through the rooms and was breaking most of the cameras. Sonic stopped at the elevator. "This is ridiculous, It'll take me forever to find the Master emerald at this rate." Sonic walked on to the elevator and looked at the floor numbers. The numbers were one to fifty. A light bulb suddenly went off in Sonic's head. He pressed twenty six button and the elevator doors closed and began to go up. Once he was at twenty six, he got out and ran a couple of metres ahead of him. Sonic jumped up into the air and flung himself back down, spin dashing through the floor. The robots looked up when they heard the sound of a saw. Sonic ripped through the ground and smashed straight down on top of one of the robots heads.

"Fire!" one of the robots shouted. They all began shouting a barrage of bullets at Sonic. Sonic ran around the hallway to avoid the wave of bullets. The tight hallways were hindering Sonic's dodging ability, so it was going to be hard to destroy the group of robots in the tight space. Sonic decided to ignore them for now and pressed on. He was confident that Eggman had put the Master emerald on the middle floor.

As Sonic continued through the rooms, it was clear that Eggman knew where he was. There were robots littered around everywhere. As much as he'd love to smash them, he needed to focus on getting the Master emerald before they get the brains to move it.

Sonic turned a corner and he quickly ducked to avoid a swinging claw. Sonic took a couple of steps away from the robotic crab. It swung it's claw a couple of times at Sonic. Sonic shifted side to side, avoiding the assault with ease. The crab swung it's claw at Sonic again. This time Sonic moved his body to the side and grabbed it with both of his arms. The robot tried pulling his claw back, but Sonic held on to it firmly. Sonic turned around and swung the robot over his shoulders. The robot smashed on to the floor on his back. Seeing a wide open centre in the robot, Sonic jumped into the air before spin dashing into the crabs stomach. After he had cut into the centre of the crab, he jumped out of the robot and ran a safe distance away. The robots stomach then blew up, sending metal shards everywhere. Sonic looked back once before continuing on.

Sonic sped through the rooms, quickly checking for out of place stuff. If there was a room with the master emerald, it was going to stand out. Sonic turned a corner and was met with a huge door. Sonic walked up to the door and saw a password was needed to enter. He hadn't seen any robots for a while. He figured it was the explosion that had moved all the robots off their posts. Not wanting to attract any unwanted attention, he began typing in passwords. After trying to many passwords, he was then locked out. Sonic groaned in annoyance and started spin dashing into the wall. The wall was made of a very strong metal, but after a couple of seconds, Sonic had ripped through.

"Whew, that was almost a problem" Sonic said as he brushed off his slightly smoked quills. Sonic quickly zipped around the room, looking for anywhere the Master Emerald could be hidden. After he had practically turned the place upside down looking for it, he heard the sound of metal footsteps approaching. Sonic looked up at the ceiling and saw a vent. Sonic jumped into it and knelt down. The robots entered the room and scanned the room.

"If the Master Emerald isn't here, then where is it?" Sonic thought to himself. Sonic waited a while longer, but having realised that the robots must know he's in the room if they're still looking, Sonic dropped down from the vent and started homing attacking them one at a time. Having got caught off guard and formation, the robots couldn't get a shot near Sonic as he was bouncing off each of them at such high speed. None of the robots were very big or strong, so must of them fell after a single homing attack. After clearing them out, Sonic ran out of the room, thinking hard about the location of the Master Emerald. He returned to the elevator, dealing with a few stray robots along the way. He pressed the number fifty button. His response was an error sound. Sonic pressed the forty nine, forty eight and forty seventh buttons, getting the same response.

Sonic growled in irritation. "Shutting off the elevators, really? Like that's going to stop me." Sonic said with a small smile at the end.

* * *

Eggman impatiently tapped his fingers on the table. Commander 1 and 3 were chasing Silver and Blaze around, with no luck. Eggman had never seen any any of the Sonic crew run away from his robots before. Clearing speed was not something that was on his mind in the development of his latest robots. Eggman wasn't a fool, he knew well that getting the Master Emerald and the two chaos emeralds was the main objective of their assault on his fortress. He was aware that Silver and Blaze were trying to bait him into sending more robots and giving Sonic less problems in his search. So his attention was on the fifty floors of the fortress. He knew Sonic was behind the destroyed cameras, but luckily for Eggman, he had set a built in replacement for each camera, if it was to be destroyed. If there was one thing Eggman hated, it was not knowing what was going on in his own fortress. Right now though, the place was chaos.

"Took you long enough." Eggman said as Cubot walked into the room with four more robots. They put the master emerald down. "Boss, why did you want the master emerald brought to you? Cubot asked. "Because I want this thing right by my side, now get back to work! Does anyone have eyes on Sonic!" Eggman said, looking around the room. All the robots looked at him, before quickly turning their heads away. Eggman gritted his teeth.

"Actually, one of the cameras on floor forty one spotted him smashed through the floor and then the ceiling." Orbot said. Eggman calmed down a bit. "Oh, okay... WAIT, WHAT!" Eggman grabbed Orbot and lifted him up. Before he could say anything else, Sonic burst through the floor and land swiftly to the side of the hole. Eggman stared in shock with his mouth open.

"Nice of you to bring the Master Emerald to one of the most obvious places. I'll be taking the Master Emerald, along with the two chaos emeralds you have. One of which is in this room" Sonic said with a smirk. Sonic then pointed to a gun than Eggman had left on the table.

"It wouldn't happen to be in there, now would it?" Sonic's smirk twisted into a grin.


	31. Chapter 31 Fortress Break in part 3

**Chapter 31 Fortress Break in part 3**

Eggman stared in shock at Sonic. Sonic began slowly walking towards Eggman. Eggman quickly snatched the gun off the table and pointed it at Sonic. "Lets be real, Eggman. Do you really think you can hit me before I snap that gun in half." Sonic said. Eggman pointed to one of the far left camera screens. In it, a few robots had Tails cuffed and were walking towards the elevator. Two of the robots had their blasters pointed directly at Tail's head as they were walking.

Eggman grinned. "As you can see, Sonic, you may have me caught without my robots to help me, but I'm prepared for everything. A genius like myself, always hold the trump card." Eggman began laughing. Sonic's smirk had long faded as he now just stared at the screens. "If you so much as move a finger, that fox is history." Eggman said as he walked towards the exit, looking at Sonic the whole time. A couple of robots then entered the room and put themselves between Eggman and Sonic. Eggman stopped as he heard the elevator door open.

"Have fun, Sonic" he said before grabbing a jet pack and flying out through the roof to join Orbot and Cubot, who had already left with the Master Emerald and a hand full of robots in the Egg Mobile. The elevator door opened and a familiar metal suit appeared. The Shadow Knight walked out and pointed at Sonic. "Sonic the hedgehog, its an honour to meet you at last." He then pulled a sword out of his back and grinned. "But it'll be an even bigger honour to kill you!" He jumped towards Sonic and sliced down at Sonic. Sonic jumped out of the way to avoid it.

"You're not Scourge. Who are you?" Sonic asked. The Shadow Knight took off his helmet revealing his face. Sonic's eyes went wide. "Sonic the hedgehog!" Sonic said in surprise. "How can this be. Could Eggman really be smart enough to make an exact clone of Sonic. However, this could also be a chance to fight with the one and only Sonic, even if he is a clone." Sonic thought to himself.

"Your looking very spaced out there, faker. Whoops, is only Shadow allowed to do that". When he got no reply, he continued. "Unfortunately, the great doctor Eggman gave me the name, Clone Sonic." He gritted his teeth and his fists started to shake in anger. "He said I have to whoop your butt before I can be called Sonic, but he never gave me the chance. He said I was a failed experiment. However, now I'll prove myself and destroy you. Ready?" Clone Sonic said as he pointed his sword at Sonic.

"Of course. Bring it on, Sonic" Sonic got into a fighting stance. Both hedgehogs charged at each other.

Eggman was now in his Egg Mobile and flying high above the forest. He wanted to see Sonic get clobbered by Shadow, unfortunately he was shocked by what he saw. "WHAT! It cant be! I thought I destroyed those clones!" Eggman shouted from his Egg Mobile. He turned on his communicator and contacted Shadow. Shadow was currently bringing an unconscious Tails up to the second floor from to top.

"What is it, Doctor?" he answered. "I thought I sent you up here to deal with Sonic, so where are you!?" Eggman shouted loudly into the speaker. "Sorry Doctor, but I found Tails wondering around, so I had to make a detour. I didn't want your prisoner escaping."

Eggman took a deep breath. "Fair enough. Gave that brat to someone else and get up here and take care of these clowns!"

"Yes, Doctor". Shadow quickly dropped Tails off with some robots and went to the top floor.

The elevator door opened and Shadow was met with a body being flung at him. Shadow and Clone Sonic smashed into the back of the elevator door.

"Get off me!" Shadow said before picking Clone Sonic up and flinging him back at Sonic. Sonic sidestepped to avoid it. Clone Sonic picked himself up and growled in frustration. Sonic eyes darted quickly at the two.

"They both have the same armour Scourge had, but these two don't appear to be on the same team. So why do they all have the exact same armour?" Sonic thoughts were becoming very disjointed just thinking about it.

All three of them were now in a triangle formation, each one of them taking glance at the two enemies to they're left and right. All of them pondering on who to attack first. "We appear to be at a stand off, hey Clone, how about we take out Sonic first?" Shadow suggested. Clone Sonic smashed his fist into the ground. "I am the real Sonic! I am not a Clone!" he shouted in anger, running into Shadow and ramming him through a wall.

Sonic smiled. "Idiots." he said before walking over to the glass. He looked out and saw Eggman in the distance. Sonic was about to jump through the window, but was forced to duck to avoid a spinning ball.

"Where do you think you're going, faker." Clone Sonic said punching his fists together. He took out his sword and charged at Sonic. He swung multiple times at Sonic, but Sonic dodged each one. He then stepped back and jumped into a spin dash, with the blade still in his hand. Sonic did a back flip to avoid the sword spin dash. Clone Sonic went straight through the floor.

Sonic walked around the room, listening very closely. Suddenly, chaos spears were thrown at him. He quickly jumped up to avoid them, but was caught by the explosion and sent flying through the roof. Shadow walked out from the Shadows, but was sliced in the back from a spin dash that had rocketed up through the floor. Clone Sonic then kicked Shadow away.

Clone Sonic was walking over to finish him off, when the floor completely broke apart, sending both of them through the ground.

Sonic had just gotten up when he saw the floor collapse. "What am I doing? I came here for the sole purpose of getting the Master Emerald and the two Chaos Emeralds. I didn't come here to knock these guys around all day. I want to have a long fight with Sonic, seeing all of his moves first hand, but there's a time and place for everything and now's not the time for messing around." Sonic went to the other side of the fortress. He got into a running stance and blasted off to the other side, jumping at the last second. While in midair, he scanned the forest around him. He could distinctively see a trail of burning trees leading back to the beach. As he finally landing on the ground,He Landed on one knee, creating a small crater from the huge fall. He slowly got up and began running towards the trail of fire, hoping to find Silver and Blaze.

Blaze breathed heavily, holding her arm in pain. Commander 1 stomped around the forest, checking behind every tree. Blaze and Silver had gotten split up in the fight with Commander 3. Reflecting on the moment, she realised that if they had taken Commander 3 out quickly, Commander 1 and a swarm of more robots wouldn't have been able to assist it. Silver had Commander 3 and the swarm of robots after him while she got stuck with Commander One. Blaze had been caught by the edge of the blast radius of a rocket and luckily only got skimmed on the side by a sword. It was still extremely painful. The only two things on her mind right now was holding her wound and praying that the giant robot didn't find her. For the first time in a while, she was terrified. It was different from when she was trapped in the portal. In the portal she felt like she was in a dream, but now it couldn't have felt more real.

Blaze slowly limped from tree to tree, moving when it had it's back turned. Because of her heavy breathing and the loud footsteps of the robot, she didn't hear something land behind her. Hers ears perked up at the sound of a beam. She turned around and saw a beam hit her straight in the chest. Eggman grinned and walked closer to Blaze. Blaze was stuck in place as the energy swirled around her body. Before she knew what was happening, she passed out.

"Thats it Blaze, rest. Eggman then laughed. Orbot and Cubot floated out of the Egg Mobile. "You are truly a genius, Doctor Eggman" Orbot applauded. Cubot set off confetti from the Egg Mobile and started dancing around.

"Of course I am. I was so narrowly minded when I tried capturing Shadow on Angel Island. By transforming the weapon into a much more mobile version and changing it so it can work on anyone, I can use this to make them all obey my every command, ho ho ho ho ho". Eggman chuckled. The energy around Blaze disappeared and she collapsed to the floor. Cubot and Orbot grabbed Blaze and laid her down in the Egg Mobile. They got in the Egg Mobile and flew back into the air. Orbot and Cubot stared at Eggman the whole flight back to the fortress.

"I've never seen you this happy, Doctor" Orbot said.

"Is there any reason I shouldn't be? I have a mind control weapon at my finger tips. I now have Blaze to join Shadow in serving me. Commander 3 is wearing Silver down, I still have a barely scratched Commander 1. I have Tails captured, two emeralds and the Master Emerald. Not to mention the magnificence of my Egg Driller! All thats left is Sonic..." Eggman paused for second. "All alone... I know Zavok would have been most amused by this, but I guess I'll have to enjoy this by myself. And I was about to abandon this beauty." Eggman said looking at his fortress in pride.

"Eggman, I hate to interrupt your moment of happiness, but there are more freedom fighters then the ones on the island". Orbot interrupted.

Eggman laughed, "More freedom fighters! Who!? After I deal with the ones on the island, who the hell is going to stand up to me!? Knuckles? The Egg Driller took him out in one hit last time. Amy? As if. Oh wait, I forgot about Cream!" Eggman starting panicking for a bit before bursting out laughing again. He looked down into the forest and stopped laughing. On the tallest tree, Sonic stood at the tip, glaring directly at Eggman.

"The only thing stopping me. The only thing thats always been in my way, since day one. Is him. Eggman glared back at Sonic. Orbot and Cubot backed away from Eggman.

"This time, I'll personally bury you. Whatever's left..." Eggman said in pure hatred, a hatred that could never have been concealed up so well with jokes and games, could never have been stronger. The hatred for one another was so great that you'd melt if you got in between it.

Sonic's hatred for Eggman was no less. However, the pain that the real Sonic had faced over the years wasn't going to be ignored any longer. All though this new 'Sonic' had never felt or seen any of this, the memories he had of the blue blur reminded of the pain his body had experienced over the years. The pain that Sonic the Hedgehog had endured. He was created because of what Eggman had done to Sonic. The difference was, he was willing to do want Sonic never could.

He was going to destroy Eggman.


	32. Chapter 32 Fortress Break in part 4

**Chapter 32 Fortress Break in part 4**

Eggman clapped his hands together in a dramatic fashion."I have to congratulate you on saving everyone who was trapped inside the portal. Quite impressive". Eggman took out his computer and pressed a few buttons before putting it away and looking back at Sonic. "I must especially thank you for getting rid of Scourge. It was so kind of you to get rid of another thorn in my side."

Sonic smirked "You're welcome Eggman, but we really should just get this over with now. So stop wasting my time and just bring out the Egg Driller already" Sonic said firmly.

"My pleasure" Eggman thought before grabbing the computer again and pressing a button.

Sonic's head spun around at the rattling of the tree. It sounded to Sonic like it was coming from the ocean. A giant head slowly began to emerge from the sea. giant robotic arms slowly rose upwards, practically causing miny tsunamis with ever movement. The arms and legs then began fully unfolding, showing their true size and destructive force. The most terrifying thing about it, was the giant Drill in its hand.

"Ho ho ho ho, quite a sight isn't he. Unfortunately for you, he's even stronger now." Eggman said with a grin. Sonic raised an eyebrow at this.

"I know you're so curious as to how he can be even more powerful from the last time you faced him. Structurally, he isn't much different. However, his power source is now comprised of five Chaos Emeralds!" Eggman began laughing loudly.

"WHAT!" Sonic shouted in disbelief. "You only have two chaos emeralds!"

Eggman continued to laugh. "Not anymore! Though, it's not you're fault, Sonic. I mean, how were you supposed to know that all of your so called friends would be incompetent fools and practically give me the Chaos Emeralds!" Sonic was in complete shock.

"Tell me how you got your hands on all seven Chaos Emeralds" Sonic asked.

"Oh my, how civilised of you. Just for that, I'll tell you. After you 'disappeared', I was able to successfully gather four of the Chaos Emeralds, and you're friends got the other three. At the time, Clone Sonic was working with me and he was able to capture Tails and Cream. He tricked you're friends into giving up a Chaos Emerald in exchange for your bunny friend. He kept Tails in order to help build the portal then could transverse time and space. I had actually created him with a much higher IQ then you, despite him being your clone. I was hoping that the combination of your fast mind and my high intelligence, could solve the things I couldn't." Eggman gritted his teeth in frustration.

"But I was wrong... Clone Sonic had been lying to me about the progress he was making, saying he was so close to being done. In reality, he had barely accomplished anything..." Eggman went quiet after saying that.

Sonic intently looked at Eggman. Eggman continued after a couple of moments. "I foolishly trusted him, but I still decided to check up on his progress and see it with my own eyes. I went to the place and invited myself in. He was nowhere to be seen, neither was you're furry companion... I was quite irritated at first, seeing as how he straight up and left without my consent, with the prisoner no less. But when I looked at what he had done, I was left humiliated. Humiliated in thinking that a clone of a moron like you would ever accomplish anything, even with a higher IQ... Anything I create or build is a reflection of myself. For them to fail, is a failure for me..." Eggman sighed. "Not that a rodent like yourself could ever understand a thing called failure... But when I killed you, I couldn't have been more thrilled. And now..." Eggman's frown shifted into a wicked grin.

"I WANT TO RELIVE THE EXPERIENCE!" Eggman shouted before the Egg Mobile turned towards the Egg Driller and began flying towards it. Sonic was a bit spaced out and wasn't sure what to do. He knew he couldn't jump to the Egg Mobile, so it felt pointless to pursue Eggman right now.

Sonic called Blaze on his communicator. After waiting for a bit and getting no response, he decided to call Silver. After a few seconds of beeping, Sonic heard a voice on the other end. "Sonic? Sonic, I've got a big problem!" Silver said urgently.

"You do? Well I doubt its any bigger then my problem, but lets hear it." Sonic said.

"I cant find Blaze! I've been almost everywhere on the island at this stage and I can't find her anywhere! I tried to call her on the communicator, but she's not responding!" Silver said in a panicked voice.

"Calm down, Silver. Just track my communicator with yours and get over here before Eggman does something drastic in his Egg Driller. We can worry about Blaze later, we have to focus now. Besides, she can handle herself. Now get moving. I have to call Tails." Sonic said.

"On my way!". Silver began flying in Sonic's direction following the tracker on his communicator.

Sonic called Tails. Again, he got no answer. Sonic sighed. "This is getting out of control." Sonic thought.

Suddenly, Sonic heard an all too familiar voice. "Greetings to all of the rodents that are still loitering on Eggman property. The time has come for all of you to meet your end, and with the Egg Driller on my side, that will be but an easy task. Surrender yourselves and I will spare you're lives. Sounds a whole lot better then being dead, but that's just my opinion." Eggman's voice could be heard throughout the entire island, via the giant speakers on the Egg Driller.

Silver spotted Sonic and flew over to him. "Where's Tails?" he said, landing next to Sonic.

"Tails isn't responding. Look, Silver, this probably wont sound to great to you, but I've been weighing the odds in my heads and it doesn't look good for us" Sonic said seriously.

"What do you mean?" Silver asked.

"I mean that when I was in the fortress, I met Shadow and a clone version of myself." Sonic said, getting straight to the point.

"Shadow!? And a clone of you!? What!? Silver said in surprise.

"The clone is an evil version of me and Shadow must have been brainwashed. They're not working together as of now and are currently fighting, but if they put aside their differences and team up... its over for us" Sonic said looking at the ground. Silver was shocked at what he was hearing from his confident, speedy friend.

"But-". Was all he could get out before being interrupted by Sonic.

"Eggman has the Egg Driller powered by five Chaos Emeralds. By now, he probably has it powered by all seven of them... Even if Shadow and the clone don't work together and only one of them comes to help Eggman, we cant win this. Blaze and Tails are either missing or captured and you are already in bad enough shape as it is." Sonic stated.

"But, but-" Silver stammered before getting cut off by Sonic again.

"No buts, Silver. I'm must likely the only one who's in shape to take Eggman on, but the odds are too stacked against me... We're going to quickly go around as much of the island as we can and see if we can find them, then we'll meet up at the beach and leave on the X Tornado, with or without them." Sonic turned away from Silver, but before he could begin running, a hand grabbed his shoulder. Silver spun him around.

"HOW DARE YOU, YOU SELFISH HOG!" Silver spat in Sonic's face. Sonic eyes went wide in shock.

"You think just because the going gets tough, that you can just run away!? Well you can't! You would just leave Blaze and your best friend behind! I don't know who you are, but you're nothing like the Sonic i knew and respected!" Silver said in anger. However, he wasn't the only one that angry after what he'd just said. Sonic hit Silver's chest with the palm of his hand, sending Silver to the ground.

"Wake up, Silver! This fight is already over! We lost. You're so blinded by you're emotions that you cant even see how outmatched we are. If we take Eggman on now and lose, who will stop Eggman from taking over Mobious?" Silver had no answer to that.

"We're running out of time, Silver. The Egg Driller has finally started to move. If we're to have any chance of finding them, we have to go now. In twenty minutes, we will meet on the beach and get to the X Tornado... I'm sorry it has to be like this, but If you're not there... you'll be flying back on you're own." Sonic said before bursting off into the woods.

Silver picked himself up and clenched his fists. "I wont leave you guys behind, I promise..." Silver floated up into the air and flew above the forest. As he flew through the woods, a tear rolled down his eye.

"Blaze..." Silver thought.


	33. Chapter 33 Fortress Break in part 5

**Chapter 33 Fortress Break in part 5**

Shadow and Clone Sonic were still fighting in the fortress, causing absolute chaos. They had broken numerous walls and ceilings. They were currently on the thirty first floor. After losing sight of Shadow, Clone Sonic had begun running through the halls, looking for him.

Clone Sonic stepped into one of the robots repair rooms and began looking around. He swiftly turned around at the sound of clanking and jumped to the side to avoid a chaos spear to the face.

"Sneaky little rat!" Clone Sonic said in a venomous tone. He ran over to Shadow and punched him in the face, sending him into the wall. Shadow jumped over Clone Sonic to avoid his spin dash. Clone Sonic took out his sword again and began delivering a series of slashes at Shadow. Shadow dodged most of the, but he got two slices along his chest and one on his arm. Luckily, his metal armour took the damage.

"Come on, is dodging all you can do!" Clone Sonic said tauntingly. Shadow sprinted around Clone Sonic and began running in circles around him. Clone Sonic didn't know what Shadow had planned, but he wasn't waiting to find out. He jumped out of the circle Shadow was running in. Shadow immediately jumped up and homing attacked him in midair, knocking him to the ground.

"Chaos Spear!" Shadow said before shooting three chaos spears down on Clone Sonic.

"Ahhh!" He screamed as he was hit with all three. The explosion blew a hole in the floor, sending them both to the floor below.

"I'd better stop before I really annoy Eggman" Shadow thought as he fell. He saw that Clone Sonic had been buried under a pile of rubble, with only his arm sticking out. Shadow grinned

"I guess Eggman was right about you. How disappointing." Shadow said before leaving. The moment Shadow left, Clone Sonic's hand began to twitch. He clenched his fist tightly.

"You'll... pay... for this. You'll all... pay." Clone Sonic said weakly. He growled in anger as he tried to get to his knees, pushing debris off himself. He slowly picked himself up. As he stood up, small pieces of his armour began falling off. Half of his helmet then fell off, showing off his red eye. He picked up his sword and put it on his back. He cracked his back and let out a long sigh. After a quick check for major injuries, he went to the elevator and pushed the button for the first floor.

"Shadow... Sonic... I'll show you both more pain then you can possible imagine. There is only one Sonic. Me!" He thought angrily, punching the elevator door in frustration.

Before he could reach the bottom floor, he heard an alarm go off.

* * *

Sonic had been looking for Tails on every floor, with no look. He was taking no stealthy precautions, so he wasn't surprised that he now had the whole Eggman army after him. Luckily for Sonic, Eggman had sent out his biggest robots to deal with Silver and Blaze, so the base had not many heavy hitters left. Even with that going for Sonic, he had no time to fight robots. He didn't want to have to leave Tails behind and he was running out of time.

"Come on, Tails, pick up!" He said in frustration, calling Tails' communicator for the sixth time. He had set a timer on his communicator for twenty minutes and he only had six left. After another floor with no Tails in sight, he went to the next floor.

"Why did I bring him with me. I should have trusted my gut instinct and left him at the plane." Sonic thought angrily. As Sonic kept running and dodging robots, his brain froze.

"I Know I shouldn't do it, but... I can't leave Sonic's best friend behind. I haven't even known the fox that long... But this isn't for me though. This is for Sonic." Sonic then heard the sound of robots being smashed, so he stopped and turned around.

He was met with a red eye glaring at him.

"I don't know what you want or why you're randomly picking fights, but I don't have time for these pointless interruptions. Go take you're issues out with the robots, they're are probably more after me. Go fight with them. I'll play with you some other time." Sonic said, dismissing Clone Sonic by turning around and running off.

"You coward! Get back here!" He shouted, running after Sonic. Sonic groaned in annoyance as he continued running through the fortress with Clone Sonic on his tail. After scanning all the rooms, he spin dashed up to the next floor and kept running.

Clone Sonic was following close behind, but he couldn't gain any distance. They both continued to run, until Clone Sonic stopped and realised something. "He might be the same speed as me, but he's going through every room in search of something. If I just run to a room he hasn't ran through, he'll have to show up." Clone Sonic thought, before running in the other direction.

* * *

Sonic noticed that he wasn't being tailed anymore, so he tried his communicator again. He got no answer. He sighed. He had two minutes left and half the floors still to be finished. He decided not to check the rest of floors as he knew it would be fruitless. He got into the elevator and pressed the fifty button. In no time at all, the elevator door opened up. He walked out and saw Orbot and Cubot typing on the computer. In a flash, he was beside Orbot.

"Where's Tails?" Sonic said. Orbot and Cubot sprung off their seats and hit their heads off the roof.

"Sonic!?" they screamed in unison.

"Obviously, now tell me where they are, and make it snappy." Sonic said looking at his timer. Orbot and Cubot looked at each other and then stared back at Sonic. After five seconds of this, Sonic grabbed both of them and banged their heads together before flinging them against the wall. He quickly scanned through the computer, in hope of finding anything related to Tails' whereabouts. He was stopped by the sound of a beep going off on his communicator. He looked down at it and saw that the twenty minutes were over. He began walking towards the elevator.

"Cubot floated off the ground slowly, sparks coming off of him. "You're lucky... that most of the robots have been moved to the Egg Driller through the underground tunnels. If they were here, they'd make you apologise for making me all sparky and dizzy" Cubot said in a drunken like voice.

"Underground tunnels?" Sonic said in curiosity.

"Cubot! Don't be telling intruders about the secret tunnels! What if Eggman finds out!?" Orbot said to Cubot in an angry tone. Sonic walked away as they then started getting into an argument. He got into the elevator and pushed the button for floor one. He put his hands over his eyes and sighed. Once he reached the bottom, he sprinted away from the fortress. On his way to the beach, he saw a giant light coming out of the Egg Driller and onto the trees. Sonic noticed the light wasn't doing any damage. The robot moved its head to the left and shun the light in Sonic's direction. Sonic put his back against a tree to avoid it.

"A scanner..." Sonic waited until the light stopped. The giant robot turned its body in Sonic's direction and a familiar voice was heard.

"I see you, rodent!" Eggman said, just before the robot shoot multiple rockets out of his back. Sonic eyes went wide. He blasted off into the woods. The rockets began hitting all the trees behind Sonic. Sonic turned his head and saw a sea of fire gaining on him. Sonic then burst off at the speed of sound, getting a safe distance away from eggman.

Sonic quickly reached the beach and looked around for Silver. He shook his head and sprinted out into the sea. He spotted the X Tornado and jumped into the cockpit. As he started up the engine, he spotted the Egg driller running to the beach at an unnaturally fast speed for a robot.

"What! Thats not possible! It cant be, unless... he has all seven chaos emeralds powering it." Sonic thought in despair.

The X Tornado rose off the water and into the air. Sonic turned the plane around and began flying away from the island.

Just as the plane was flying away, the Egg Driller reached the beach. Eggman grunted.

"If that little rat thinks he's getting from me that easily, he's in for a nasty surprise!" Eggman shouted as the Eggdriller aimed its hand at the plane. A red energy beam came out and headed straight for Sonic.

Sonic saw it on the radar and swerved the plane out of the way of the beam. He saw a few more heading towards him. He growled, spinning the plane from side to side, narrowly dodging each one.

"He's way too far away too be able to get this close with his beams. Its almost as if its shooting homing beams!?" Sonic said, dodging one or two more. After seeing no more, he sighed in relief, flying safely back the rest of the way.

The Tornado having completely gone out of Eggman's view, he was forced to stop shooting beams at Sonic.

Eggman banged his hand off the table. "You got lucky..." he said. Eggman then dropped the frown and smiled.

"It doesn't matter." Eggman picked up his mind control gun and looked at it proudly. "With this weapon at my disposal, I'm unbeatable. And with the newest member of the Eggman Empire at my side, everyone will finally accept that I, Doctor Eggman, am the sole ruler of this planet. Ho ho ho ho ho!" Eggman laughed as he spun around his chair widely.

After he'd calmed down, he called one of his robots over. "Bring me the fox, we have many battle tactics to discuss." Eggman chuckled.


	34. Chapter 34 Higher Duties

**Chapter 34**

Sonic reached his and Tails' house and parked the plane. He stepped out of the cockpit and dropped to the ground. He walked inside and sat down on the sofa and turned on the television. He put on the news channel.

Sally Acorn was shown sitting at a huge round table with around 20 other animals. Sally was one of the youngest and most influential figures in politics. Of course her position as a princess gave her the highest authority, but she didn't want to abuse her power to forcefully get her way. Her ideas didn't have to please everyone, but she felt much more comfortable with changing things, if most of the government and people agreed with it. Unfortunately, Sally seemed to be the only one with peaceful thoughts in mind. Even if it didn't quite seem that way.

Right now, Sonic watched as there was a big argument taking place.

"Please look here, princess Sally." said Kevin, handing Sally a bunch of papers. "Crime rates have increased by twenty six percent in the last two weeks! That's outrageous!." He shouted angrily.

Sally glared at him. "Do not burst out like that again!"

He put his head down, "Sorry, princess."

Sally's face softened a little. As the princess, she had to keep everyone in line, but she hated to be too intimidating. She had the power to legally do whatever she wanted and she knew that must be a terrifying thought to anyone who thought they'd wronged her in any way.

"That's fine. Now, I know that this is a very rough time for everyone, but we must trust in the Freedom Fighters. They have kept us safe up until now, and I doubt they'll stop anytime soon." Sally responded. Everyone else at the table began murmuring to each other. Of course, Sally could hear a lot of it, because of the anger in their voices. They obviously weren't too reassured by that answer. Sally knew she wasn't a favourite among the others, and when she decided to have these private talks put public, they weren't too happy about it. She knew this, but she wanted the public to know about everything they talked about. Good and bad.

"The Freedom Fighters? We cant solely rely on them to do everything, especially since the loss of the hero who made us all believe so hard in their system. Besides, this isn't really about Eggman, this is about the common criminals who are rapidly sprouting up out of nowhere. Whereas our police force is not responding to this. In fact, you lowered the count of our force a month ago. So how do you propose we stop this crime spree?" Eric asked.

"We wait and trust that once Eggman has been stopped, the crime will follow. This meeting is over." Sally stood up and began walking towards the door, dismissing everyone. Everyone stood up to leave, except for Kevin. He clenched his fist tightly under the table.

It was the same thing everyday for Kevin. Every time he left this room, he found himself thinking about what they had accomplished. He always found himself back at the same answer. Nothing. The past week had been even worse. Kevin had been thinking like this for awhile, but it had now become the mutual feeling in the government. They weren't even sure why they were there in the first place. They didn't have the power to make any meaningful change without the princesses verdict on the matter. In Kevin's eyes, it was a dictatorship. Nothing else. But today was the last straw for him.

"This meeting is not over, Sally Acorn!" He shouted in rage, standing up and slamming his hands on the table. Everyone turned to Kevin and gasped. Sally was stunned by this outburst.

"Kevin, that's no-" Sally was about to repeat what she had said before, but Kevin sharply cut her off. "No, Sally! I'm sick and tired of this crap, day in and day out. People out there are suffering and you wont lift a finger to help! You expect the freedom fighters to do everything! I've always hated you're family, but you're the worst of them all!" Kevin violently swiped all the papers off his table, along with his mug.

"Security, get him out of my building! Sally said angrily, pointing at Kevin. Two wolfs came in and took Kevin away. He glared at Sally as he was escorted past her. The broadcast had cut after Kevin's initial outburst, but everyone had already seen all they had to see to know what a mess it was, including Sonic.

Sonic turned off the television. "Now that Eggman knows I'm alive, there's no reason keeping it a secret any longer." Sonic thought. He decided that he would head over to the castle before he had a serious discussion with the others. He sent a message to Rouge, Knuckles, Amy and Silver, telling them to be at his house in an hour.

Sonic left his house and made his way to the Acorn castle, where Sally lived. As he was just nearing the castle, he spotted Sally sitting by a lake. Sonic stopped and walked over to her. Sally had her eyes closed and her hands against them

"Having a hard time, Sally?" Sonic asked, sitting down next to Sally. Sally opened up her watery eyes and looked to her side.

"Sonic, what do you want now."

"You knew I was alive?" Sonic was expecting a bigger reaction from her.

"I'm just imagining you again, aren't I." Sally said, putting her eyes back into her hands. Sonic thought about what to say next. He smiled.

"I'm not real, huh. Fair enough. I guess you won't mind me doing this then." Sonic said, putting his hand to her back and pushing her into the water. Sally went head first into the water and swallowed a bit of water. She desperately swam to the top and poked her head out. She spitting out some water and coughed a couple of times.

"What the hell is wrong with you!" She said angrily.

Sonic chuckled a little. "Don't blame me, I'm not even here, right."

Sally was about the to shout at him, but she stopped. She starred at Sonic for a moment, still keeping herself afloat.

"Y-you're Sonic." She said awkwardly. Sonic nodded. Sally's eyes lit up and a huge smile appeared on her face. She quickly swam towards Sonic. She jumped up out of the water and latched on to Sonic's neck. Sonic closed his eyes and let himself be practically strangled by the overly hyper Sally.

"It's you! I cant believe its really you!" She cried into Sonic's shoulder, squeezing Sonic harder. Sonic knew that Amy did this a lot, but for Sally it was an unusual thing to see. Sonic couldn't deny that this was the kind of situation that called for this kind of affection. He returned the embrace, putting his arms gently around her back.

"Its alright, Sally. Everything's going to be... fine, Okay." Sonic said, trying to be reassuring. He knew things probably couldn't get any worse, but he didn't want to put any more stress on her.

"I know, I know. Its just so hard. Being a princess and all..." She wiped her eyes with her left hand. She sniffled. "but you're back now! Everything's going to be fine, right?" She said hopefully. Sonic starred off into the distance. He let go of Sally and gently pulled her off him.

"Listen, Sally. This is important. Tell everyone that I'm back and that the Freedom Fighters are ready to take Eggman down. Also, the government's right. You need to dramatically increase police patrol. If you don't, you'll lose the support of the people. Okay." Sonic said seriously. Sally looked away from Sonic, thinking about what he'd said.

"I... I trust you Sonic. But what if things don't get better?" Sally said worriedly.

"It will. Now I have to go. But before I do, I have to tell you something important."

"What" Sally asked

"Eggman's got... a powerful new robot." Sonic said with a sigh.

"Doesn't he always" Sally said with a light chuckle.

"...Yeah... bye, Sally" Sonic said, before running off, leaving Sally confused and happy. "When did Sonic get stripes on his arms and legs?" she thought.

As Sonic ran back, he couldn't help but think about not telling Sally the truth. "I'm sorry, Sally. I cant tell you how bad things are. Not in you're condition. And I definitely can't tell you about Tails. It would only worsen you're emotional state." Sonic thought miserably.


	35. Chapter 35 A Dangerous Lie

**Chapter 35 A Dangerous Lie**

Sonic checked his wrist. " _Twenty minutes until they arrive. How to occupy myself till then..._ " Sonic turned off the television and went outside. He went into Tails' workshop and decided to have a look around. As he walked in, he saw pieces of metal lying around everywhere. Sonic began rummaging through anything he could find, hoping to stumble upon something useful. After finding nothing, he checked the drawers under the worktable.

" _There they are._ " Sonic pulled out two guns and looked them over. Since the names or effects of the guns weren't written anywhere in the workshop, Sonic decided to go outside to test the guns. One of the guns was painted yellow and the other was painted similar, but with the addition of white lines going through it. He put down the yellow gun and decided to test out the white and yellow gun, first.

He aimed it at the ground a few metres away from him and fired. A small white beam shot out and froze the ground around the spot it hit.

" _A freeze gun? I don't know how effective that would be against Eggman, but an interesting idea by the fox_." Sonic put down the gun and picked up the other one. He was excited about this one. From the moment he picked it up, he could feel the powerful energy in it. He pulled the trigger and an electric bolt came out and ripped a line through the ground.

" _Whew, not bad at all. I don't think I'll need either of these guns, but I'm sure the others could get great use out of these."_ Sonic picked up the other gun and walked back inside. His ears perked up at the familiar sound of two spinning tails. Sonic walked inside the kitchen and heard the front door opening. He left both guns on the counter.

"Sonic! Sonic, are you here?" Tails called out.

"I'm in the kitchen." He replied. Tails walked into the kitchen. He grinned wildly when he saw Sonic.

"Sonic!" He said before jumping onto Sonic, wrapping his arms around his back. Sonic smile quickly turned into a frown. He sharply looked back at Tails' head that was resting on his shoulder. Tails let go of Sonic and grinned once again.

"Its great to see you, Sonic! I was worried I would never make it off Eggman's island." Tails said in relief. Sonic glared into Tails' eyes.

"um... you okay, Sonic. Kinda creeping me out." Tails said, worriedly. Sonic smiled.

"Its nothing. I'm glad your back, Tails. Our friends will be here soon to discuss plans to stop Eggman."

"Really! I mean... that's good to hear. I sure hope we can stop Doctor Eggman before he makes his next ingenious move." Tails said.

"So do I." Sonic then heard a knock on the door. Tails opened it and saw Knuckles standing there. Knuckles smiled when he saw Tails.

"Tails!? You're alright?" Knuckles said in confusion. Tails grinned sheepishly

"Yeah, I'm a bit surprised myself. I still can't believe I got out of there okay." Tails stepped to the side and let Knuckles in. They walked into the sitting room. Knuckles looked around.

"Where is everyone else?" Knuckles asked.

"Not here yet." Tails responded. They each took a seat, waiting for the others to come. In around five minutes, the others had all arrived. The only ones who didn't show was Rouge and Silver.

"No Silver or Blaze?" Amy asked. Tails shook his head. Everyone awkwardly glanced at each other.

"So... any great ideas on how to stop Docter Eggman" Tails asked with a smile. They all glanced at him with dumbfounded faces.

"You're asking us? You're the smartest one here. You think of plans!" Knuckles said, more angrily then he meant. Tails rubbed his hands together and darted his eyes left and right.

"Uh... of course. We need to... go straight at Eggman, head on and see what happens."

Again, he was met with the same looks. "You, Tails, are suggested a head on fight with one of the most powerful robots we've ever seen? You must have banged you're head hard on that island." Amy said.

"Yeah, even my ideas are better then that!" Knuckles chimed in. Tails rubbed his arm nervously.

"You're right, Amy. I must have banged my head and forgot about it... I'm going to take a small nap." Tails walked past Cream and made his way upstairs.

"Wow, I guess he mustn't have wanted us to worry." Amy said, looking at Sonic. Sonic wasn't listening to Amy, though. He had his back leaned against the wall and was looking at the ground, tuned out of the conversation.

"Hey, Sonic... Sonic!?" Amy said louder. Sonic looked up at her.

"Yeah?" he responded tiredly.

"Don't you think you should check on Tails. He didn't look so good." Amy said with concern in her voice. Sonic straightened himself up.

"You're right, he isn't good. I'll go up and sort out the situation." Sonic left the room and went up to Tails' room. He put his ear to the door and heard faint whispering on the other side. He knocked on the door.

"Can I come in, Tails?" Tails fumbled a little, trying to turn off his communicator.

"C-come in" Tails said, burying himself under his sheets. Sonic opened the door and leaned against the frame of it.

"How are you feeling?" Sonic asked.

"A bit better. I'm kinda thirsty, though."

"That's good. By the way, hows Eggman doing?" Sonic asked. Tails felt a chill up his spine.

"U-uh... W-what are you talking about, Sonic?" Tails answered quietly. Sonic closed the door and folded his arms.

"Don't be like that, Tails. Be honest with me and I'll do my best to be understanding, okay?" Sonic said calmly. Tails looked away from Sonic and at his wide open window. He gritted his teeth.

"I... I'll be honest." Tails said.

"Glad to hear it." Sonic said with a smirk. " _Like I had much of a choice in the matter, I've already had to put my arms around you're toxic skin for nothing,_ _you insufferable blue hedgehog._ _"_ Tails glared at Sonic as he walked over to the side of his bed.

"I really only came up here to ask you one question. Have you been brainwashed or have you been manipulated into joining Eggman's cause? I mean, I'm pretty sure I know the answer, but I thought I'd ask." Sonic asked.

"Neither. I have been freed from you're control. I no longer work mindlessly for you murderers! I now know the truth about the glorious Eggman empire... and the spiteful 'Freedom Fighters' that are stopping the greatest genius from advancing the world forward!" Tails throw his sheet off himself and flew up to Sonic.

"Nice speech. I'll have to ask Eggman to write me one when I go around brainwashing people." Sonic said with a chuckle. Tails stared in disbelief at Sonic.

"Why are you laughing!? Eggman has you beaten and you know it. So what's with got you so happy!?" Sonic hand snapped forward and grabbed Tails by the throat. Tails made a choking sound and instinctively put his hands on Sonic's arms, in an attempt to brake his grip.

"Because If you don't tell me all of Eggman's plans and the weaknesses in the Eggdriller... I'll kill you." Sonic said, darkly. Tails was still desperately trying to loosen Sonic's grip and couldn't say anything in response.

"You think any of us will care about you're death, Tails. We've already killed plenty of you Eggman cronies. You'll be next if you don't cooperate." Sonic dropped Tails to the ground. Tails gasped for air and rubbed his sore neck.

"You're going to go down there and help us think up a 'good' plan to stop Eggman. We may act friendly with each other, but if the others find out about this, they'll surely kill you on the spot. So lets keep this between us." Sonic went over to Tails' bed and grabbed his communicator. He crushed it in his hand and dropped it out the window.

"You won't be needing this anymore. Now get moving." Sonic pointed towards the door. Tails slowly walked out, still rubbing his neck. Once he had left his sight, Sonic let out a sigh. " _This is nothing like what Sonic would do. In fact, I really don't think I could've acted any less like Sonic. I don't imagine he'd approve of me choking his best friend... I still have no idea on how to be Sonic, but I have to try and do what Sonic would do from now on... as best I can_ _..."_

Sonic made his way downstairs and thankfully saw Tails helping everyone come up with ideas on how to stop Eggman. Sonic sat down in a chair and absorbed in the conversation. As it went on, Sonic found that Tails was acting exactly like his old self, except more lively. In fact, he was talking so quickly that Sonic noticed something else. Tails was secretly terrified. It was as if each idea he thought up was an extra minute being added to his life.

 _"I don't think Eggman realises what he's done by telling Tails such extreme lies about us. To Tails, we're not just his enemies. We're monsters._..


	36. Chapter 36 An Unstable Unit

**Chapter 36 An Unstable Unit**

An hour had passed since Tails had come back downstairs and things had taken a turn for the better. Sonic's plan had worked. Tails had given blueprints on Eggman's robots, showing structural weaknesses, weaponry and anything that could be used against Eggman. Tails told everyone that he'd found the blueprints while he was on the island. Obviously Sonic knew better. Sonic had noted that Tails didn't have any information on the Eggdriller, and it wasn't a mystery as to why he didn't have them.

"I think that wraps this up. I'd say we're well equipped to fight Eggman." Tails said, putting all the blue prints into a bag.

"Thanks for getting us all the information, Tails. I think everything's going to be alright!" Cream said confidently. Just then, the window flew open and Rouge flew onto the sofa next to Knuckles.

"My, my, you guys sure have been busy." Rouge said. Knuckles scooted away from Rouge.

"What are 'you' doing here? There isn't any Chaos Emeralds for you to steal, so get lost!" Knuckles barked. Rouge looked at Knuckles and dropped her eye lids. "Oh come on, Knucky, I'm on you're side, remember."

"pfft, yeah right. You'd switch to Eggman's side in the blink of an eye if their was something shiny in it for you." Knuckles said, folding his arms and turning away from Rouge.

"Possibly... but at the moment, we need to work as a team. Besides... I don't think I'm the one you have to worry about betraying you." Rouge said, glancing at Tails. Tails sunk into his chair.

"What are you looking at Tails for? You're not seriously thinking he betrayed us, are you?" Amy said in disbelief.

"Pay no attention to her, Amy. Its just Rouge trying to start up trouble." Knuckles said. Rouge stood up.

"Look, I'm not messing with you. Things have gotten serious as of lately. In fact, I was also in Eggman's fortress earlier today." Rouge said.

"Y-you were?" Tails said, nervously.

"Yes, unlike you guys, I actually know how to infiltrate buildings. You guys did help keep Eggman off my back, though. Thanks for that. Also, look at what I found." Rouge took off her her own bag and took out some blueprints. She laid them out on the table.

"These look awfully familiar, don't they." Rouge said. Everyone went over to the table and looked at them. Tails gasped, before quickly covering his mouth.

"These look like the ones you showed us, Tails..." Amy said. Knuckles picked one up.

"Yeah, they are the same." He said.

"Except they're not the same. The information on these blueprints is opposite to that of Tails'." Sonic said, glancing sharply at Tails.

"hehe, I... um." Tails backed away slowly, putting his arms up in defence. Everyone looked accusingly at Tails.

"Whats going on, Tails?" Amy asked. Tails backed away some more until he hit his back against the wall.

"I... must have grabbed a fake set of blueprints. Whoops, hehe." Tails looked at everyone, hoping they would buy his story.

"How do you know mine aren't the fake ones?" Rouge said, raising an eyebrow. Once again, Tails was in the spotlight.

"Um... just a guess?" Tails said with a shrug and a nervous grin. _"Crap, I'm really screwed now! I have to say something useful or they'll gut me."_

"L-listen, I know that my blueprints are fake, b-but I know where Eggman is going to attack." Tails said. Everyone was surprised by this. Well, almost everyone.

"Really? Where?" Knuckles asked.

"I know you probably don't care, but its Knothome." Tails said. Amy and Cream gasped.

"Not Knothome! It cant be! Eggman has never been able to find it before!" Amy said in shock.

"I hate to speak against you, Tails, but how do we know this isn't another lie." Rouge said.

"Hey, I wasn't lying! I took fake blueprints by accident!" Tails said, defensively. Rouge put her hands on her hips and grinned.

"Alright, alright, if you say so, fox boy. I guess we'll have to find out, won't we... Oh, by the way, do you happen to know when this attack is going to happen? I mean, I'd love to hang with you guys, but I have things to do so do you have a day I could come back at... or something like that?" Rouge said, resting her head on her wrist. Tails thought about it for a few seconds.

"I think he's attacking in two... weeks." tails said, unconvincingly. Sonic walked over to Rouge.

"You know, right?" Sonic whispered to her.

"Please, I've seen better lies coming from drunks at the bar." She whispered back. "First, though..." Rouge took out a bottle of wine from her bag and flew into the kitchen. Everyone glanced curiously in her direction.

"Where does she think she's going? Knuckles said. He got multiple shrugs as a response. Rouge came back in, holding a few glasses. She set them down on the table along with the wine bottle. She opened up the bottle and poured herself a glass. She held out the wine bottle to everyone.

"So, who wants some first? Rouge said, brightly. Everyone just stared at the bottle for a few seconds.

"Wine? I don't know about this, Rouge" Amy said, fidgeting with her fingers. Rouge smile died down a little.

"Come on, I choose to share this with you. So I'll ask again. Who wants some, first?" Rouge asked again. Sonic took the bottle and started pouring himself a glass. The rest of them stared at Sonic.

"Sonic, what are you doing!?" Knuckles said in shock. Sonic glanced at Knuckles for a second before taking a sip of his wine. Rouge smirked.

"See, Sonic's getting into the flow of things. Just a sip or two won't hurt." Rouge said taking the bottle and dangling it in front of Amy, teasing her.

Amy reached for the bottle, but quickly recoiled. "I don't know..." Rouge shrugged.

"I don't see what the big deal is, you're all old enough to drink." Cream looked at Rouge in surprise.

"Well, almost all of you." Rouge chuckled lightly. Knuckles walked up to Rouge and snatched the bottle out of her hand.

"Whoa! Relax, Knuckie, There's plenty to go around." Rouge said with a wink. Knuckles ignored her and walked into the kitchen and began pouring it down the sink. Rouge put her hands against her face and gasped.

"What have you done!" Rouge shouted, flying over to knuckles and taking the bottle back, checking to see if there was anything left.

"Hey, I did you all a favour! We still don't have one good way of stopping Eggman. So no drinking until then." Knuckles said, sitting back down. Rouge folded her arms and pouted.

"Whatever... have you guys still not got any good ideas? Not even you, 'Tails'." Rouge said, looking at Tails. Tails growled under his breath, knowing she was deliberately putting him back in the spotlight. Luckily for Tails, another voice intervened. Sonic finished off his glass and put it down on the table.

"Okay, that's enough. I was hoping an idea would sprout itself from one of you, but it doesn't look like its going to happen anytime soon so I'll give you my plan." Sonic said.

"Wait, you have a plan? Why did you waste our time when you already had a plan? Knuckles asked.

"I was curious. My curiosity did not pay off. Anyway, the plan is for us to stay in this house until Eggman attacks. We don't know exactly when, so until then, Tails can go scouting for Eggman in the Tornado. Hopefully, Tails can spot Eggman and get back here and warn us before Eggman attacks. You think you're up for it?" Sonic asked, looking at Tails. Tails mouth opened in shock.

"Really!? I mean... sure, no problem!" Tails happily replied. He quickly made his way to the tornado outside and hopped in. Once the cockpit door was closed, _"_ _Cheers, you blue clown."_ he laughed to himself and took off into the sky, with a smile on his face.

Cream nudged Amy's shoulder. "Huh? What is it, Cream?" Amy looked down at Cream. "Can I... ask about the thing?" Cream said, rubbing her feet together. Amy shook her head. "I'll ask, okay." Cream nodded.

"By the way everyone, Cream is going to be helping us in our fight against Eggman. Isn't that great!" Amy said, optimistically. Knuckles eyes went wide. "What! You want 'Cream' to help fight against Eggman!? Are you insane!" Knuckles shouted, stomping over to Amy. Cream turned away from the angry looking Knuckles and starred down at the ground. Amy saw this and growled. She walked right up to Knuckles face.

"Who are you to tell Cream what she can and can't do! She's been training hard at home to become part of the freedom fighters and she won't be treated like a baby. Especially not from you!" Amy spat in Knuckles face. Knuckles went red with anger. "What's that supposed to mean!?" He shouted back. Both of them were now almost touching noses.

Rouge walked over to them and pulled them apart. "That's enough you two. You're not getting anywhere with fighting. If Cream has been training hard for this, then we shouldn't deny her the chance, so long as she understands the danger." Rouge spoke calmly. Amy and Knuckles gave each other one last angry glare before returning to their seats.

"I don't know, Rouge. Knuckles might have a point. If she is to risk her life against Eggman, she has to prove her strength. Especially considering how dangerous Eggman is at the moment." Sonic said. Rouge put her hand to her chin. "I think a sparring match would be a good test of her strength, wouldn't you think so?" Rouge asked Sonic.

"I was thinking just the same thing. In fact, I think I would make a good sparring partner. However, we need to be alone for it." Sonic said. Rouge looked suspiciously at Sonic.

"Oh... why exactly? Amy asked. Sonic looked away. "Trust me, I'm doing it for a reason, okay."

"Okay... I guess" Amy couldn't think of any reason against it, but it was an odd thing to ask.

* * *

Tails was listening to music in the tornado, looking forward to giving Sonic's location to Eggman. He hummed to himself in tune with the music. _"Whoops, better send Sonic's location to Eggman. Just to be sure he isn't out on the hunt."_ Tails thought to himself. He turned on the scanner. He continued to hum as he checked the location. The radar showed a blinking red dot on the Tornado.

Tails stopped humming and gasped. "He's on the Tornado!"


	37. Chapter 37 A Fight for Respect

**Chapter 37 A Fight for Respect**

Tails fearfully looked around him. He saw no one. He breathed a bit easier, confident it was just a mistake on the radar. Tails still spun the plane upside down, just to be sure. After he was fully satisfied, he put the plane on autopilot so he could see what was wrong with the radar. He took out his tool kit and checked to make sure everything was how it was earlier. After seeing nothing wrong, he could only come up with the conclusion that the screen wasn't working properly. Tails opened up a screen and typed in a code he had earlier received from Eggman. As he was doing this, his neck started feeling hot. He rubbed it with his hand, coughing a little.

"Damn Sonic..." He mumbled under his breath. Eggman's face suddenly appeared on the screen.

"Ah, Tails! I was getting a bit worried when we were cut off earlier. I see you handled whatever happened." Eggman said, smiling. Tails neck started getting hotter. He grunted and gritted his teeth.

"Hmm, it seems you had a rough time with them. At least you've now seen first hand what they can do." Eggman couldn't help but feel a little giddy. His plan was working much better then he'd hoped. Though, he was really curious as to who did this.

"So which one of the heartless monsters did this to you, my furry companion." Eggman asked. Tails winced.

"The worst one of them all. The blue hedgehog." Tails said quietly, as his throat seemed to get worse the more he spoke. Eggman made a dramatic gasp.

"That's awful, Tails! However, I did warn you about what he could do." Eggman said, knowingly. In reality, he was pretty shocked about this information. He could definitely sense a chance in Sonic's mood, but he didn't think the hedgehog could be so ruthless with his best friend. _"He must have figured out that Tails is working with me, but how? I'll get the information out of Tails when he's back on my ship."_

Tails looked away from the screen and coughed.

"Forget about it, Tails. The despicable Freedom Fighters will pay, along with all those who stand with them. I promise." Eggman said with a rub of his moustache. Tails looked back at the screen and nodded.

"Don't worry, Doctor Eggman, I have no doubts that the glorious Eggman Empire will triumph over evil once again." Tails said, confidently. Eggman grinned.

"Good. Now get back here as soon as you can. I've sent you the location of the Egg Destroyer, in case you forgot were you're going."

"I haven't forgot, Doctor Eggman, I'll be there shortly." Tails responded. Tails closed the screen and turned off autopilot.

 _"I hope the great doctor knows what's wrong with my radar, as I know he want's to keep track of the hedgehogs movements. That damn hedgehog broke my communicator so this radar is the only way I can track him. Doctor Eggman's going to be really disappointed in me if this radar doesn't work..."_ Tails grew increasingly worried at the thought of it.

* * *

Cream followed Sonic out into the woods. She wasn't sure where Sonic was taking her, or why they had to fight out in the woods, but she wasn't complaining when they stopped by a shallow stream. She smiled in delight when she saw the glistening clear stream. She remembered this stream. Her mother would sometimes take her there for picnics by the water. When her mother couldn't accompany her, she would go by herself and pick all sorts of weird flowers that she couldn't find in the meadow. Her mother had told her it was called 'Flower Forest', because of the unusual variety of flowers.

Cream sat down by the stream and smiled brightly, loving everything about the place.

"We can start the sparring match now, if you're ready." Sonic asked. Cream was in a bit of a trance and wasn't paying attention. Sonic coughed to get her attention. Cream turned in surprise.

"Huh... oh, that's right. We have to fight now..." Cream said, with little enthusiasm.

"If you don't want to fight me, I get it, but I need to see you fight. I won't go too hard on you, but you better take this seriously, or else..." Sonic voice lowered at the last two words. Cream stepped back. _"Or else what?"_ She thought in confusion. She put her hands up.

"I'm ready." She said determinedly. Sonic wasn't quite sure if she really was ready for this.

"Are you positive you're ready. This is you're last chance to back out." Sonic said. Cream said nothing, but her mood quickly changed. He friendly face disappeared and she started looking even more serious then Shadow. _"I won't be treated like a baby anymore. I won't be made a defenceless hostage ever again. I've worked hard for this and I'm not backing down anymore... I 'will' be a Freedom Fighter."_

She ran up to Sonic and swung her fist at Sonic's face. Sonic moved his head to the side to avoid it, her punch skimming his face. Although he dodged the punch, it was closer then he would have liked. Sonic hadn't expected this from Cream. Cream's normally soft and caring personality seemed to disappear when she fought. She was much different.

Sonic blocked a torrent of punches to the face, still struggling to see how this was the Cream that he saw looking at the stream, without a care in the world.

Cream stopped the punching and attempted a side kick at Sonic's ribs. Sonic turned to the side and blocked it with his arms. Sonic sighed. He was happy that she was taking it so seriously, but she appeared to have the same weakness as Tails. Cream then took to the sky's, using her ears to fly above Sonic. Sonic looked curiously at her. She flew straight at Sonic and attempted to kick Sonic in the side of the head. Sonic turned to grab her leg with both of his hands. Sonic then proceeded to spin her around, just like he'd previously done with Tails. Cream gritted her teeth as he started to speed up.

Sonic had a feeling this would be the end, However, Cream wasn't having it. She growled and with all her might, she stomped Sonic's hands with her free foot, forcing Sonic to release her. She went flying through the air, hitting the ground quite roughly. She quickly jumped to her feet and flew at Sonic as fast as she could. Sonic shook his hands, surprised of what had happened. She turned to Cream and was met with two feet smashing into his jaw, sending him flailing to the floor. Cream hovered for a few seconds, before dropping to her feet and panting. She sighed in relief and grinned.

"I did it! I got you good, Sonic!" She cheered to herself. She stopped bouncing up and down when she didn't see Sonic get up.

"Oh no, Sonic, are you okay!? I'm so sorry!" She ran over to him and knelt down beside him. She looked at the side of his face and saw his eye closed. She slowly edged her hand closer to his face. Suddenly his hand shot up and grabbed her wrist. She jumped in surprise. He let go of her wrist and smiled. Cream frowned.

"Hey! Were you pretending to be hurt, just so you could scare me! That's not very nice!" Cream folded her arms and looked away from Sonic in frustration. Sonic picked himself up and rubbed his check.

"Sorry about that. I wasn't trying to scare you. I was just letting you know the danger of dropping you're guard." Sonic said. Cream dropped the moody expression and unfolded her arms.

"Really? I'm sorry, I thought it was over..." Cream said, almost apologetically. Sonic shook his head.

"It's fine. Besides, I really only wanted you to get one or two hits on me. I really wasn't expecting a powerful two foot kick knocking me to the ground. It was quite impressive and also quite surprising." Sonic praised Cream.

Cream smiled and turned away, feeling weirdly embarrassed. She was also surprised by it. Sure she had been training hard, learning martial arts from Espio, but she had never been so aggressive before. She had also been surprised by the willingness of Espio and Vector to come over and help her train. She didn't even ask for Vector's help, but he was more then happy to come over with Espio to 'inspect his training method', even though he spent most of the time talking to her mother. She found it a bit bizarre.

"I have no doubts that you trained very hard, but I just have one question." Sonic said.

"What?" She asked.

"Was that you're strongest attack?" Sonic asked. Cream tilted her head.

"I... I guess so." She said, awkwardly. Sonic thought about this for a second.

"Hmm... Okay, when Eggman attacks, I think you'd be best suited to fighting the weaker robots alongside Amy. Alright." Sonic said.

"Okay... Wait, does that mean I'm an official Freedom Fighter now!" She asked, excitedly.

"Well, you have my approval." Sonic responded. Cream jumped up and down with joy.

"I did it! I'm one of you guys now! I can't wait to tell my mother and Cheese!" She said, unable to hold back the joy. Sonic scratched his head.

"Yeah... We're done now, so you can go on ahead. I'll follow you in a second." Sonic said. Cream nodded and began skipping her way back to the house, humming to herself. Sonic shook his head and chuckled lightly. _"Well that was unexpected."_


	38. Chapter 38 The End

**Chapter 38 The End**

Sonic opened the door to his house, hearing angry shouts coming from the sitting room. He opened the door and was met with a cushion hitting his face. He instinctively closed his eyes.

"Whoops, sorry Sonic! I was aiming for Knuckles." Amy grabbed another cushion and whacked it with her hammer, straight at Knuckles. Knuckles grabbed it and throw it on the ground.

"Enough, Amy! Sonic's back now, so he can tell us that Cream is obviously not fit for this mission. Right, Sonic." Knuckles said, already knowing the answer, or so he thought.

"She's ready." Sonic said.

"What! Are you crazy! She is not coming. Its too dangerous for a kid like her." Knuckles said, sternly.

Cream sighed. Once again she was being treated like a weak little kid. She was kind at heart, but she wasn't sure how much more of this she could stand. Knuckles was really starting to annoy her, even if he meant well.

"I said that she's ready, Knuckles, not that she should come. To be honest, I also think she should stay here." Sonic said. Cream looked at Sonic in shock.

"But you said I was ready, Sonic! Just back at the river!" Cream pleaded.

"I said I approved of you becoming a freedom fighter. I wasn't suggesting you should start in this battle when the stakes are this high. But unfortunately, we need all the help we can get if we're going to stop Eggman from destroying knothole, so I guess its up to you... If you're coming, you better be ready." Sonic said. Cream zoned out after hearing that. She was quickly rethinking joining the freedom fighters in this fight. She had personally not seen the Eggdriller, but she had heard enough to know it was a monstrosity of a robot. Cream gulped, having second thoughts about this.

"You're right, Sonic. She's not ready of this, so she stays." Knuckles agreed. Having let this play out long enough, Amy stood up once again to defend her friend.

"Stop treating her this way, Knuckles. She passed the silly fighting test. I mean, she knocked Sonic to the ground. The greatest hero who ever lived! If she wants to fight, she's fighting. Case closed." Amy said.

Knuckles folded his arms and gritted his teeth, thinking about it. "Fine! But if she gets hurt out there, don't come crawling back to the wise guardian of the Master Emerald for forgiveness." Knuckles sat down and closed his eyes.

Amy stuck her tongue out at him. "Wise, yeah right. Come on Cream. If we're staying here until Eggman attacks, then we're staying far away from those guys!" Amy stomped towards the door with Cream following close behind her. They walked upstairs, looking for a decent guest room. Sonic looked over at Knuckles, who was still looking very angry.

"If you want her safe Knuckles, you'll have to watch her, because I won't be." Sonic said.

"Fine! I'd expect nothing less from a stranger." Knuckles said, opening his eyes and glaring at Sonic. Sonic ignored Knuckles' comment and left the room. Sonic called Silver. Nothing.

Sonic left the house and decided to go for a quick run to clear his head.

He ran deep into the Flower Forest, trying to clear his head. It wasn't working. He wasn't sure what to do. He was supposed to be a symbol of hope for the fight against Eggman, but he wasn't anything close. Sure, he was strong, but that wasn't what made Sonic such an important figure to the resistance against Eggman. It was his cocky attitude and heroism he displayed while fighting Eggman. Merely Sonic's presence in a fight was enough to strengthen those around him. He knew if he was to defeat Eggman, he would have to replicate Sonic's ability to lift others and make even the most horrible situations seem okay. It wasn't what he wanted, but it was what Sonic would do. And right now, he was bearing that name. No matter how infuriating it was to work with Sonic's friends, he would have no choice but to put up with them until the Eggdriller was destroyed and the Chaos Emeralds were in his hands. After that, he wasn't sure what he would do. Sonic stopped running and leaned against a tree. He put his hands on his face and shook his head.

 _"How am I going to get those idiots in line. Why did all the smart people have to get brainwashed. How does Sonic work with some of these immature clowns. Not to mention the useless Metropolis resistance that probably couldn't keep control even if there was no Eggman."_

Sonic sat down and closed his eyes, deep in thought. So deep that when he opened his eyes, he saw an open black space. In front of him, a very familiar blue hedgehog stood.

"Sonic..." He murmured. Sonic flashed a cheeky grin and a thumbs up.

"The one and only... kinda. Its obvious that there is a lot of conflict inside you're head... our head." Sonic finished, slightly confused.

"I get it now. You're the Sonic side of me. The hero side."

"Yeah, that's about right. Its obvious that you're confused and seeking helping. otherwise, I doubt we would be literally split apart inside you're head." Sonic said.

"Its true, I am confused. On one half, the others call me Sonic and I'm supposed to be a hero. On the other half, I just can't be you. I can't do what you do, because I'm not a hero."

"I get that you're not like me, but to be honest, I'm not even me. I'm just a shadow of whatever of Sonic's personality still resides in you. It obviously isn't much because I feel quite weak. Almost like my thoughts could just be ignored... or gotten rid of." Sonic said, his face now looking very puppet like.

"What are you saying?"

Sonic's cheerfully nature suddenly disappeared. Sonic looked at him with pure hatred. "If I had any say... you wouldn't have laid a finger on my best friends throat. But my opinion wasn't even a factor in your judgement. Was it.

"..."

"I know you don't give a damn about my friends." Sonic's face softened, his anger now gone. "Please... just try to care about them. Even a little. They're not as weak as you think. If they were, they wouldn't still be here, now would they."

"..."

Sonic smiled and walked over to him. "Lets forget about everything that's happened before this. Start fresh. You won't remember any of this when we wake up... but I will."

Sonic held out his fist, awaiting the other fist to join it. But nothing happened. The other fist did not even move. Its owner however, turned and walked away. The other hand continued to dangle in the air, its owner, trembling. The other hand, moved further and further away. Not on its own will, but by a much stronger force. The hand disappeared into the darkness, leaving the other to continue trembling. Still held out, in hope that the other would unite with. The trembling hand, so fixated on this thought, didn't realise it was held by nothing. Soon, the hand was gone. The face of the owner, was the last thing that remained. Until it too met the same fate, leaving nothing but a small puddle on the ground. A puddle of tears, left for the events of the future to justify it and give it purpose.

Sonic's head shot forward and he started breathed rapidly, his heart pumping like crazy. He looked around him and saw trees all around. His breathing slowed and with one long breath, he collapsed back against the tree.

 _"What just happened to me. I...I feel... different._ _I knew a good run in the fresh air would clear out my head._ _My mind is clear now. Everything is."_

Sonic held his hand forward. He focused chaos energy in his hand and an outline of a Chaos Emerald began to form.

"Chaos...Control!"

...uoy kooL dniheb


	39. Chapter 39 Casino Floor

**Chapter 39 Casino Floor**

Tails stood beside Eggman in the elevator as it slowly descended. Once they'd reached their destination, They stepped out and were met with flashing lights. Tails looked around and saw that this part of the ship was no ordinary floor. It was a Casino floor. It was a gigantic room, littered with poker tables, slot machines and even some other sections that Tails would have preferred not to notice. There was a big disco ball in the centre of the room that had bright colours shooting out in every direction.

They walked towards a large table, where Shadow and C Sonic were already waiting. Tails held his nose and his face scrunched up. There was a heavy smell of alcohol and smoke in the air. Tails looked around and to his surprise, there was mostly animals in the casino.

Eggman sat down next to Shadow. C Sonic patted the seat next to him. Tails sat down next to him uncomfortably. Sonic grinned at Tails, who looked away away in response. C Sonic raised an eyebrow at this.

Tails took the menu and opened it. He looked at the dishes for a second before one in particular caught his eye. "I'll have the lamb." Tails said.

C Sonic chuckled. "Couldn't wait to have the lamb again, huh. Actually, I know what would go perfectly with that. Let's see..." C Sonic scanned through the different wines. "There it is!" He said with a grin.

"There is what?" Tails asked, confused.

Eggman snapped his fingers impatiently. A female looking robot on wheels, quickly made its way over to Eggman.

"Are you ready for you're food, Doctor Eggman?" The robot asked in a feminine voice.

"Of course I am! And it better be really good, because I've looking forward to taking a break from expanding the Eggman Empire."

Everyone made their orders and to no ones surprise, Eggman ordered an egg based meal and C Sonic ordered chilli dogs.

The robot soon returned with three different bottles of wine.

"Enjoy." the robot said before leaving. Shadow opened up each of the bottles and poured everyone one glass from each of the bottles. Tails eyes went wide when he saw the three full glasses in front of him.

"Don't worry, buddy. You don't have to drink them all." C Sonic said. He pointed to the glass in the middle. "But make sure you have this one. I know you like it." Tails scratched his head in confusion. "What do mean by that?" Tails asked. Eggman looked over at the two and started sweating.

"Now that we're all feeling relaxed, lets have a little chat about how we can finally finish off the monstrous Freedom Fighters." Eggman said with a toothy grin. They all nodded. Eggman sighed in relief. He was glad when Shadow had informed him that he had made a deal with C Sonic. Eggman's worry had been that C Sonic would somehow join up with the Freedom Fighters and he'd have to deal with two Sonic's. Of course, Eggman wasn't too happy with Shadow going behind his back and promising two chaos emeralds to C Sonic, but he didn't really have a choice if he wanted to ensure victory for the Eggman Empire. Unfortunately, he completely forgot about C Sonic and Tails having to meet each other. He was hoping that C Sonic wouldn't blab to Tails about things he shouldn't know.

"I don't think there's much to discuss, if you don't mind me saying, Doctor Eggman. We are already planning to destroy Knothole in two days. That is clearly a special place for them, so they'll try to stop us. Once we beat the remaining Freedom Fighters, no one else will stand in our way. I'd say this battle is already over." Shadow calmly took a sip of his wine.

"You can never assume victory against that blue rodent! Trust me, its a big mistake that I've repeatedly had to learn the hard way."

The robot made its way back to the table, with everyone's orders in its robotic arms.

"I hope its to your liking." The robot said with a cheery voice.

A few minutes passed and everyone was almost done eating. Tails finished the last piece of lamb on his plate and laid back, stuffed. He couldn't put his finger on it, but he could have sworn he'd had that same exact dish and wine before. He didn't even remember ever having wine before, but with a tiny bit of peer pressure from C Sonic, and he had drank three glasses no problem.

Tails looked at the animals sitting at the tables around him. There was nothing special about most of them, but some of them stood out.

 _"This lamb, this wine, these animals sitting at the tables. It all feels so familiar._ _This is some crazy deja vu._ _"_ Tails tried to think of a reason for this, but as soon as he tried to recollect the memories of these events, his head started to hurt. He shook his head in pain, suddenly feeling like he was going to pass out.

C Sonic shook Tails by the shoulders. "Tails!" He said loudly. Tails blinked multiple times.

"Wha-what." He said, feeling dizzy. C Sonic punched him lightly in the shoulder.

"Whoops, there was clearly no reason to be worried about you. You're just drunk." C Sonic chuckled, feeling a bit woozy himself. Shadow shook his head. He leaned over to Eggman who had surprisingly been quiet.

"Perhaps adding C Sonic to the mix, wasn't the best idea. I mean, look at him." Shadow said. Eggman looked curiously at C Sonic.

"Its true that while creating a clone of Sonic, I might have overlooked a lot of things. Which is why I got rid of him in the first place. The fact that he still cares for Tails, even though he used to be an enemy of the Eggman Empire, is quite horrible. I suppose since it works in our favour, there's probably no harm in it."

Shadow nodded. C Sonic looked over at Shadow and Eggman. "Anyone interested in some poker." He said, pointing to at a poker table at the far side of the room.

"Yes, I suppose I could go for some of that." Eggman said. They got up and made their way to the poker table. Tails was still kind of wobbly as he walked. He took his eyes off the ground and was bumped to the side by something. He looked back and saw a bear snarling at him as he continued to walk. Tails kept walking, trying to think of something else.

 _"Somethings not right..."_ He had seen that bear before, he knew he had. But when he tried to think about it, his head started throbbing in pain. He looked at the animals sitting at the tables again. This time, he was starting to notice something very strange about everyone in the casino. Everyone had weapons. Tails was sure that since they were in the sky and they had a heavily armoured flying fortress, they were safe from The Freedom Fighters or any other danger that might come after them. But the way that everyone was watching everyone else, with their hands ready on their weapons. It was as if no one trusted anyone else...

Tails was just about to sit down at the poker table when he felt a tap on his shoulder. Tails slowly looked behind him.

"Y-you want me to s-show you a g-good time." The bright pink fox asked nervously.

"Ah!" Tails screamed in fright. Eggman, who been shuffling the deck of cards very elegantly, dropped them all over the table when he heard Tails' outburst.

Tails ran past the young fox and bolted towards the bathroom, slamming the door behind him. Eggman breathed heavily, holding his chest. Suddenly Orbot and Cubot floated over to Eggman.

"Are you okay Doctor?" Orbot asked.

"Yes!" he responded snappily. "Wait a second! What are you two bucket heads doing here? I thought I told you two to watch the radars for any intruders! Get moving!" Eggman shouted angrily, Obviously upset over his four step card shuffling routine being interrupted by Tails. Right now, he was in no mood for Orbot and Cubot's shenanigans.

"Aw, come on. Can't we just stay for the wheel spin. I love that part!" Cubot said, already admiring the giant wheel beside the table.

Eggman clenched his fists. "If I have to ask you one more time, I'll stick you're head to the wheel and spin it so fast, you're brains will malfunction!" He roared, standing up threateningly. Orbot and Cubot flew away as fast as they could, trying to escape the angry looking Eggman.

Eggman sat back down and picked up the cards. "I'll start again." He said.

"Oh, come on!" said one of the players at the table. An eruption of groans then emitted from the table, with similar comments being grumbled.

Tails washed his face with cold water, trying to calm himself down.

 _"No, no. There is definitely something wrong with all this. All the signs are here. This has to be a criminal hideout, I just know it. Eggman... he must know about this. Which means... Eggman's a criminal too!"_

Tails couldn't believe how easily he'd been deceived. Somehow, Eggman must have messed around with his memories. Tails was still convinced that The Freedom Fighters were evil, but now he was convinced that this whole battle was nothing more then a power struggle between two evils. Tails had been so convinced that Eggman was trying to save the world up until now. But once he had the first realisation, it was very easy to look at everything he'd seen on the ship in a new light. And it all reeked of evil.

Now though, Tails was faced with a bigger conundrum. Who should he fight with? And more importantly, who were the good guys?

Tails dried his face with a towel and left the bathroom. He decided to go back to the table instead of trying to make an escape as he was sure he'd be caught. besides, he really didn't know what he'd do even if he did escape. Who would he turn to for help? Was there even anybody to turn to? Was he... alone?"


	40. Chapter 40 Blind Fortune

**Chapter 40 Blind Fortune**

Tails watched as Eggman flashed a grin and grabbed a ton of chips from the centre of the table. Eggman then proceed to stack them with the others. C Sonic watched as his small pile of chips became even smaller. Shadow's pile was also looking a little bare. Tails had come to the table and refused to play cards with them as he was in no state of mind to play cards. One thing that did catch his mind was a hedgehog that had been sitting at an empty table by himself since he got here. A couple of animals had come over and exchanged a brief conversation before leaving, but that was it.

Tails stood up and began walking over to him.

"Hey! Where are you going?" C Sonic asked.

"Don't worry, I'll be back in a second!" Tails quickly responded. Tails manoeuvred his way around two robots carrying drinks and walked up to the chair in front of the hedgehog. The hedgehog saw Tails coming and shook his head when Tails reached the chair.

"I'm guessing you want you're fortune told, right?" He asked, not particularly enthusiastic.

"...Yeah." Tails slowly said, just going with it. The hedgehog put his hand out towards the chair. Tails pulled out the seat and sat down.

"So you swapped over to the bad guys, huh. Even I wouldn't have predicted that." He said.

"I..." Tails cut his own sentence short. He still wasn't a hundred percent sure that Eggman was the bad guy. Even if the guy just implied that everyone on the ship was bad.

"Am with the 'bad' guys" Tails finished. The hedgehog shrugged.

"Its fine. You'll get what's coming to you." He mumbled the last part to himself. Tails' keen hearing picked it up perfectly though, thanks to his big ears.

 _"What does he mean by that?"_ Tails shuffled his feet awkwardly.

"Oh right... I suppose I should give you the future telling you wanted... Now then, I will give you three future predictions. Alright scumbag?" He said mockingly.

Tails scowled, regretting ever following his curiosity.

"Do you mind leaving you're hands out so I can feel the top of them." The hedgehog asked.

Tails sighed, putting his hands on the table. The hedgehog put the palm of his hands on Tails' knuckles and closed his eyes.

Tails looked around the room as he waited for him to finish. Tails didn't believe in fortune telling. He found it to be one of the most stupidest things he had ever encountered. He had gotten his fortune told before when Amy had dragged Sonic to an amusement. Tails really didn't want to be a third wheel, but Sonic had desperately wanted 'for' Tails to be the third wheel. It was no surprise that Amy had dragged Sonic into a fortune telling hut. Tails had went in afterwards to give it a chance. He wasn't impressed.

The hedgehog opened his eyes, taking his hands off Tails' and leaning back against his chair once again.

"Alright then, prediction number one... you will find something that you have found before..." He said. Tails looked at him, confused.

"What does that ev-"

"Silence! No talking until I'm done... Ahem. Prediction number two... you are on a journey... and at the end of this journey... everyone will get what they deserve." Tails now looked even more confused. "What does that mean? What does everyone deserve? Peace?"

"Prediction number three..." He chuckled to himself. Tails glared at him and stood up.

"Whats so funny!? Tails said impatiently. He was sick of this already. The predictions were too vague to mean anything and he would never know if the predictions were right or wrong because he wasn't even sure what they were.

"Prediction number three... you will die..." He grinned. Tails almost tripped on his chair as he stepped away from the table. His hands quivered in fear. He had been thinking in his head the whole time that fortune telling was fake. But now though...

"Y-you're lying. You're just a fraud! You made that up because you don't like me!" Tails said angrily.

The hedgehog nodded. "You're right. My three predictions were nothing but lies... off you go then." He waved his hand at Tails and laid back in his chair with his eyes closed. Tails turned around and walked away with a very angry look in his eyes. Tails hadn't hated someone this much in a long time. It was completely unlike him. He had just met the hedgehog, but after a few grins and one threatening prediction, Tails hated him with a passion.

"Oh, by the way, Tails!" The hedgehog shouted after him. Tails turned his head around to look back at him.

"The names Mendacium. Don't forget it." Tails shook his head and walked back to his table. He knew that he shouldn't be nervous about a fortune tellers dumb prediction. But Tails couldn't help but feel a chill down his spine, even though the fortune teller had just said that he was lying about the predictions. Tails then saw a familiar pink fox across the room, sitting with an older fox and bear.

Tails shuddered. I'm not quite sure what she was on about, but it didn't sound too good." Tails sat back down beside C Sonic.

Eggman stopped counting his chips and looked over at Tails. "The fortune teller give you any good predictions?" Eggman asked.

Tails looked down at the table. "Nothing important." Eggman looked suspiciously at Tails before standing up.

"Excuse me, my fellow companions, but I have stuff I need to sort out. Have fun." Eggman left the table and went to use the elevator. He looked at his communicator and groaned in annoyance. "What's going on with the engine, now?" He mumbled to himself angrily.

Tails gritted his teeth _"Either this is a big coincidence, or I'm so busted!"_ Suddenly Tails' neck started to hurt again. Tails dropped onto the table, holding his neck.

"Tails! Whats wrong!?" C Sonic said, panicking.

"I'm... fine." Tails breathed heavily, the burning sensation in his neck slowly disappearing. Tails looked over at Shadow and saw that he was looking at something on his communicator. He noticed Shadow's face tense up as he appeared to be reading something.

 _"Oh no..."_ Tails stood up. "Sorry guys, but i just realised I had some important work to get back to... so, yeah..." Shadow got out of his seat and walked over to Tails.

"I actually have to get back to work myself. I guess we could walk back together." Shadow said casually. Tails bit his lip.

"Sure... no problem, Shadow." Tails said.

"Good, then lead the way." Shadow replied. C Sonic looked over at them, but then shrugged and took a sip of his wine.

They walked over to the elevator and Tails pressed the number for the bottom floor. _"Great. What do I do now!"_ Tails glanced over his shoulder at Shadow who had his arms folded. The elevator door opened and they walked out into a gigantic room, full of robots, metal, junk, anything you'd expect to find in the depths of an evil robot building ship. Tails and Shadow walked through the room, seeing robots and machines working on robots and weapons.

"So, Tails. What 'important' project did you say you had to work on." Shadow teased Tails. Tails knew he was being messed with, but felt obliged to continue with his failed ruse.

"Just checking on the... Egg Driller." Tails said.

"No, you will not be working on the Egg driller. The doctor doesn't allow it." Shadow said, grabbing Tails' wrist and pulling him back the way they came.

"Hey! Why can't I work on it. I'm Eggman's number two when it comes to robots, so I should be allowed to work on it." Tails argued pointlessly. Shadow let go of Tails.

"Enough of this. Eggman knows you've changed sides and are now working for the murderous Freedom Fighters... You're despicable, Tails." Shadow said, shaking his head. This angered Tails.

"What! I never said I worked for those guys. I've just come to my senses and realised that no matter how bad we think the Freedom Fighters are, Eggman's not far behind. I mean, look at this place!" Tails slowly did a three hundred and sixty degree turn, looking at all the dangerous robots that were in the giant room.

"And Eggmans plan to build the 'glorious Eggman Empire', is just a complete dictatorship of the entire world, with him on top. Nothing more!" Tails spat in Shadow's face. Shadow was quite taken back by the aggressive tone.

"Why do you think Eggman is the bad guy? Why have you completely turned you're back on us? We're here to help. Why can't you see that?" Shadow asked.

"Because... I don't know... I just know that Eggman's the bad guy... You need to listen to me." Tails grabbed Shadow's shoulders. This was a big mistake on Tails' behalf. Shadow punched Tails square in the chest, sending him flying across the room.

"Ah!" Tails screamed in pain, holding his chest tightly, as he curled up on his side. Shadow walked over to him and grabbed Tails and began carrying him under his arm. Shadow left the room, leaving the automated robots to continue with their work. As the elevator took Shadow and Tails up, there was suddenly the ship shook violently. A red light began flashing on all floors of the ship, warning sounds going off everywhere. Shadow quickly contacted Eggman on his communicator.

"What's going on, Eggman!?" Shadow asked loudly. He saw Eggman's face appear on the communicator.

"The engines have been hit! We've lost engine one and we've taken severe damage to engine two! This must be the work of that damn fox! Where is he!" Eggman shouted into the communicator. Shadow shook his head.

"No, it couldn't have been Tails. He's laying unconscious next to me." Shadow responded.

"...Then we must have a traitor among us. Meet me at the bridge and make it snappy!" Eggman shouted. Shadow nodded. He clicked the button for the bridge and waited as the elevator went to the top floor.


	41. Chapter 41 Panic on the Deck

**Chapter 41 Panic on the Deck**

Shadow walked onto the bridge, dropping Tails to the ground. Eggman turned around to see Shadow. Shadow saw Orbot and Cubot both looking at screens showing the damages done to the engines.

"What's the situation, Doctor?" Shadow asked. Eggman sat up from his chair and rubbed his moustache, thinking to himself. Shadow took a seat as he waited for the Doctor to finish his thoughts. Eggman snapped his fingers as a thought popped into his head.

"Rouge! This must be the work of that bat!" He said.

"Are you sure?" Shadow questioned.

"Of course I'm sure! She's the only one of them that can reach this altitude. She's stealthy and that's why we haven't found her. And the reason is pretty obvious. She's a jewel thief and I have the seven shiniest jewels. I think the culprit is clear." Eggman deduced. Shadow pushed cubot to the side and looked at the damage. He zoomed in on it and saw a circular shaped hole in the side of the engine. Shadow's eyes widened.

"That damage is from a spin dash!" Shadow exclaimed.

"What!" Eggman stomped over and looked at the damage closely. He growled and turned to his two robots.

"You told me the damage was from an explosive! This is much worse because there's only one hedgehog outside of this room that can do that." Eggman quickly typed some buttons on the keyboard, sending all available robots on the search. Shadow though, was still unconvinced about this, despite having pointed it out.

"If that is Sonic, how did the hell he get up here. No plane could have landed undetected, could it?" Shadow asked. Eggman sternly glanced over at Shadow.

"Of course not!"

"Then how did he get on? The only way he could have gotten on this ship undetected is with chaos control, but that's impossible since we have all the chaos emeralds." Shadow said. Eggman clenched his fists. He began contacted all the crime bosses on the ship, seeing if there was any success on finding the culprit. None of them had. It especially infuriated Eggman when they started blaming Eggman for this, saying his huge army of robots were useless if they couldn't find one pesky rodent.

"Eggman grabbed Orbot and Cubot and slammed their heads together.

"Ow!" they yelled in unison, both of them rubbing their heads.

"Shadow, go to the ground floor and use one of the chaos emeralds to give you the upper head ag-" Eggman turned towards the elevator, just to see it closing.

"What!" He looked to the ground beside the door, seeing no one. "Tails! That little rat!" Eggman shouted angrily. Eggman turned back to the screens. "Ignore the fox, just stop that blue idiot before he does any more damage to my ship!" Eggman shouted furiously. Shadow quickly jumped into the elevator and went to the lowest floor. He arrived and quickly skated across the huge area. All the robots he had previously seen turned off, were now on. Except for the Egg Driller who remained tightly compacted into a cube shape. He got to the engines and saw a huge number of robots desperately trying to fix it. Since the engines were turned on, it was very difficult to fix them. Shadow saw pieces of robot arms and legs laying around the engines.

Shadow looked around the engines, checking to see if additional damage had been done. Shadow was starting to feel confused. It was clear that Sonic or whoever had done this could have probably done more damage then this. Suddenly Shadow heard an explosion above. Figuring that Eggman probably wouldn't mind damage to his ship as long as he caught the culprit, he spin dashed through the roof. He looked around and saw a few robots in pieces and flames. Shadow began skating through the hallway, knowing the intruder couldn't have gotten too far. He turned a corner and skidded to halt.

"You are not the intruder." The robot said.

"Obviously. Where the hell did he go!?" Shadow said, starting to feel like he was chasing a ghost. The robots ignored Shadow and went on their way.

"That's it! I'm getting the emerald!" Shadow jumped back through the hole and grabbed an emerald out of the Eggdriller. He teleported up a few floors and found himself in a similar looking hallway. Suddenly there was a huge rumble throughout the ship.

"Intruder alert!" A very loud robotic voice said. The Eggdriller's eyes light up and he unfolded, breaking the roof.

Eggman had caught on quickly to the disturbance. He tried to shut down the robot, but it was too late. The Eggriller attempted to stand, but broke through the floor first. Everyone on the ship felt this. Before they could even react to the situation, the giant robot grabbed the sides of the floor he had just destroyed and tried to hold on. Due to his humongous size, the floor under his hands gave way under the weight and the robot fell off the ship. Eggman looked at the screens in shock as he saw his magnificent creation fall through the sky. Eggman growled angrily, banging the keyboard.

"This can't be happening! This wasn't supposed to happen!" Unfortunately for Eggman, that wasn't the worst of it. He looked through the screen and saw multiply rockets and lasers coming straight for the bottom of the ship. At this point, there had been a scramble on the ship. Everyone was sprinting like their lives depended on it. They weren't fully aware of how bad it was, but they were taking no chances. There was such a scramble to the escape pods, that the crooks were literally stomping over people in there way. Guns had even been pulled out and there were warning shots constantly going off, making sure no one stood in their way. Sadly, the rest weren't so lucky. Some of them had been completely wasted, with no awareness of what was happening. Others just had the bad luck of being farthest from the pods.

"No!" Eggman shouted as everything hit all at once, the entire ship violent shook as the bottom half of the ship was practically ripped apart. Suddenly, there was a bright flash beside Eggman. Shadow toppled out of the light, fur all singed. Shadow held his arm painfully as he rose to his feet. Eggman leaned against the back of the chair, mouth wide open.

"Sir, all of you're crew are leaving via the escape pods... Sir?" Orbot asked, getting no response from Eggman. Shadow went up to Eggman and shook his shoulders.

"We have to go now! Grab on!" Orbot and Cubot gladly took the offer and jumped onto Shadow.

"What about C Sonic?" Orbot asked. Without answering the question, Shadow teleported all of them out of the ship.

Once all of them appeared on the ground beside the Eggdriller, Eggman watched as explosion after explosion appeared in the distance until suddenly there was one huge explosion. The sky was lit up with red and orange, metal pieces raining down all around them. Eggman feel to his knees, with his hands covering his face.

"Eggman..." Orbot practically whispered. They had never seen the Eggman look so broken. Sure they had seen him angry. Much too often. This wasn't the same though. He had lost so many robots and inventions on the ship. Not to mention projects he had been working on.

"Well... look at the bright side, Doctor. We still have all the chaos emeralds and the Eggdriller. Right." Cubot said.

Shadow looked curiously at Eggman as he rose to his feet. "Just... come with me you two. I'm going to burn that fucking Knothole to ashes..." Eggman said darkly. Orbot and Cubot looked at each other. They entered the robots head and Shadow jumped onto the shoulder of the robot.

"What about the rest of the crew, Eggman?" Orbot asked.

"They know where we're heading. They can make their own way to knothole, because I won't be waiting for their useless asses." Eggman said. He pressed some buttons, ordering all remaining robots to go to knothole. Some of the stronger robots had survived the crash and were now making their way to the coordinates sent. Some of Eggman's flying robots were able to make it off alright. Although Eggman had suffered a heavy defeat, losing a lot of robots and his flying fortress, had was not down for the count. Eggman still had his main enforcer, the Egg Driller. With the Egg Driller powered by six emeralds, as well as the remainder of his robots, he was still quite confident he could easily wipe out Knothole.

On the outskirts of the crash site, several escape pods were landing a safe distance away from the wreckage. A blue hedgehog stepped out of one of them and fell to his knee. Sonic looked behind him and saw that the pink fox was still in the pod. Unconscious and alone.


End file.
